claudtalks

THE OLD BOOK

2012-01-19T14:54:00.000-08:00

My ex-boyfriend gave me a book a long time ago back when we were together, telling me it had great meaning for him, a reflection on how he lived his life. I never read it and now that we stopped speaking it was time to return it to him, why was it so difficult, I had struggled with its return for weeks.

Was there some insight into his psyche that I had missed? Would it unlock some mystery as to why he could never say he loved me? I knew he did, I could feel it when he looked at me, the way he spoke to me; he’d said it twice, but retracted it, denied it, I wished he’d never said it at all. I needed to hear those words from him, from someone; finally I decided to give up and let him go once and for all, it had been eleven years.

The book was ancient, hardcover, bound, yellowed, possibly rare. Tossing it away seemed cruel, he’s asked for my assurance that I would one day return it, I had promised. I always keep my word, it was a thorn in my side, he’d let me down countless times and yet, I always had trouble letting go.

I decided to make one last trek over to his house, I would leave it outside, on his doorstep, no phone call or note. I rifled around in the kitchen and found a flimsy bag I got from some drugstore that i would normally use for trash, the morning coffee filter, tissues, pizza crusts - it would soon be home for his beloved book, it would be joined by his sister’s latest best seller. She had skyrocketed to fame by writing stories about their abusive childhood, she spun it into gold, a sweet fairytale, but I knew the truth - I fell in love with the damage, a man that could never really love back.

The drugstore bag was a sad beige color with black type that said, “thank you”. And inglorious parting sentiment, it almost seemed ironic, I thought perhaps I should choose another receptical, as I slipped both books into its sparse waterproof shell. I had started his sister’s novel, I found her style beautiful and grating in that I knew she reinvented tragedy, it was her version of her family history, but her truth nonetheless. But the other book, the one that held the secrets to my ex-boyfriend’s truth remained unopened by me. Was it that I hadn’t had my eye glass prescription renewed for several years, or was it fear of what I would find on those faded pages? Would it reveal a sweet Tom Sayer-esque tale, romanticizing his childhood days when he would scramble into town looking to roll a passed out drunk for change, or stay after the school bell rang to rifle through the lunchroom trash looking for something to eat while his mother hid under the covers at home, gorging on a Whitman’s Sampler she had bought with the dollar or two she might have used to buy some bologna and bread for her 3 hungry children?

I pulled the book from the sad “thank you” bag. It smelled like history, his house, the slim chance that I would finally make sense of my defunct love. I opened it and started to read the first paragraph, I was immediately drawn in to the prose. Simple, eloquent, a vortex. I placed it back where I had kept it on the top of my armoire, almost out of site, a sticking point, surely one day to be returned to my now "ex" boyfriend.

A BRIEF STOP IN ALLSTON

2012-01-12T12:05:00.001-08:00

I've lived in a few places, Connecticut, Brooklyn, but none more memorable than scenic Allston, Massachusetts. A total dump of a place, a low rent district on the outskirts of the B.U. campus, my parents said that I could have whatever money it cost them to house me in the Boston U dorms, I ran the numbers, I would make a pretty profit if I moved off campus.

I met my roommate in the theater department, she was studying scene design. Wendy jumped all over me when she heard I was seeking lodging off campus, and promised to stop smoking by the time I moved in.

It was a dank basement apartment, but Wendy sweetened the deal with a can of paint and an offer to coat the cigarette stained walls by the first of the month. I had a couple of lawn chairs, a neon clock, and a 1940's mannequin head that gave a living room a cool retro look. I did more of a country theme in my bedroom with some old apple crate art I had framed, a vintage hutch, and a quilt thrown over a mattress and box spring I had centered against the wall, my time spent working for Martha Stewart had a sweet design influence on my subterranean chamber. Things were OK at first, Wendy seemed over the moon that I was her roommate, and we were only a couple blocks away from the best pizza place in Brooklyn, T. Anthony's - where I had spent a couple of semesters honing my eating disorder skills with some of the other girl's in the dorm.

Wendy's room was less than refined, it smelled of dirty laundry, the floor would have been a great landing strip for a faulty mosh pit. Jeans, sheets, mismatched pillow cases, all these smells intermingling with the ever growing pile that was now being fed by her new boyfriend's dirty flannel shirts and jeans. I never saw a light turned on in there, I wasn't sure if all the bulbs were burned out, or if she, in fact, had any lighting in there at all. She seemed to be happy with whatever residual light was being thrown off the urine colored glow of the bathroom light as she picked out the day's "look" from the bedroom floor: one of two pairs of 501's she owned, and a choice of 5 faded navy blue t-shirts. She was kind of a pretty girl, but she did her best to hide it. Her boyfriend seemed fond enough of her in spite of, or because of her stage-techie de rigueur. They would spend hours in her dirty laundry padded cell with the door almost closed, the door nob was missing, and I would have to shade my eyes as I passed, I was scared that I might catch a glimpse of their dirty laundry love making. Eventually, I would hear her emerge from their sex cell, the door in desperate need of some WD-40. She would throw a used condom in our communal wastebasket in the tiny bathroom, grab a 2 liter bottle of Diet Coke, her pack of Salem Menthols, and pad back to the bedroom in her navy t-shirt and beige panties. Contrary to our verbal contract, Wendy had never kicked the habit.

I kept my bedroom immaculately clean, Wendy's bedroom had become a cautionary tale to me. The living room was similarly kept by me, but the kitchen was Wendy's domain, as I never set foot in it. Her previous "roommates" had never moved out, when she flicked the switch they all went for cover under the stove she used for the only dish I ever saw her cook - a cooked-on grease-stained cookie sheet scattered with tater tots. On her nights off from Romeo she would sit at the kitchen table in her t-shirt and beige panties, selecting the next desirable tater tot from the tray with one hand, with a lit Camel Menthol in the other. This would go on during what was usually laundry night - which consisted of soaking one of the two pairs of Levi's she owned in the bathroom sink with dish liquid, the shower rod serving as her cost efficient dryer. The drip-drip of the water from the jeans hitting the dirty bathtub became a makeshift Chinese Water Torture to me.

It wasn't all bad, a couple of girls moved upstairs from us, although they didn't look like any of the girls I knew back in Westport, or even in the dorms at B.U. They had shoe polish black hair, wore a lot of tank tops without bras, and had tattoos the likes that I had only seen on some of the Irish boys who lived on the wrong side of the tracks back in Connecticut. But they were fun, funny, and friendly. One morning I was approaching the building after doing a load of laundry, the girls were on the stoop smoking, and asked me if I wanted to come up for some coffee. I didn't drink coffee, but it sounded more enticing than going home where I would be met with a sink full of dirty dishes, Diet Coke empties, and the ever growing heap of Camel Menthol butts that covered all but the rim of the dusty topaz ashtray that doubled as a centerpiece on our kitchen table.

I went upstairs with the girls, they had a fair amount of light in there, it smelled a bit of old smoke and something else I couldn't quite identify - still, it was fun hanging out with the funny bad girls all before breakfast. The tall skinny one got out three mismatched coffee mugs while the short skinny one grabbed some bottle of booze - they married the two liquids in the three cups and rolled a joint. I was now regretting not stopping at the donut shop on my way home, I would have missed all of this, but it was too late. The substances were taking over, I was trying to act cool while I took in their prison-esque ink and their black bras that littered the kitchen floor. Just as they took a pass on my offer to go for breakfast, two men emerged from somewhere, they dropped a roll of bills on the table in front of us, stole a couple of butts from the cigarette pack on the table and went out the front door with a groggy "see ya". I never ran into the rock n roll looking fellas, or the girls again, for I would be leaving Allston by the end of that coming month.

I had grown quite depressed, my boyfriend and I had broken up before I moved out of the dorm, and he had started sleeping with some of the boys in the theater department. Seemed everyone had someone to love, Wendy and her man rolling around in the dirty laundry room, the girl's upstairs with their mystery men, but I was completely alone, curled up under my antique quilt. I soon met a handsome boy on my way home to visit my parents in Connecticut, he was sitting across the way from me on the Amtrak train. He looked exactly like John Cougar Mellencamp, he was wearing a gas station attendants shirt that said "Phil". It was actually his name, but the shirt was for affect - he was a student and artist attending Tufts Museum School. I gave him my number and didn't hear from him for awhile. I had given up hope and was sobbing in my Martha Stewart bedroom when Wendy tapped on my door and opened it, holding a lit cigarette. "Someone named 'Philip' is on the phone for you," she said flatly as she pulled on the 100 feet of tangled phone cord so that it could make it's way over to my bed. We went on a date that night, and the rest was history. He was smart, looked like Mellencamp, and lived in a huge loft on the South Side of Boston. He worked nights as a waiter at one of the best restaurants in Boston, he had cash to burn and wined and dined me mercilessly until I was spending almost every night cuddled up next to him in his loft bed in the heat-challenged loft; I was in love.

But Wendy had a bone to pick with me when I returned home one morning to fetch a fresh batch of clothes from my Shabby Chic bedroom. She said that I had broken a contract to be there, to be her roommate, friend, confident - which was surprising, she spent most of the time behind the cracked door with her boyfriend, and had nary offered me a single tot. I shrugged, inhaling the second hand smoke of the cigarette she had promised to snub out before my move-in date, I called Phil to confer and he got a friend's station wagon and moved me out that Sunday. I never made it back to Allston, not even for T. Anthony's pizza. I was loft living now, with real Punk Rockers living upstairs, performance artists in the loft next door, and a motorcycle jacket manufacturer below us, life was sweet.

I must have run into Wendy at school after that, but I don't remember, I had moved on from Allston, and Boston University pretty much altogether. I spent my days skipping school watching Philip paint, or riding his bicycle around the expansive loft. We would cook and have large parties, a girl he knew from school came up to me at one of them and said, "you sleep with Phil?" I nodded at her downgrading of my girlfriend status, she went on, "so did I, he's terrible, how do you stand it." It was true, our first night together was horrible, lasting all of 58 seconds, and it never improved; but he was a wonderful guy, showed me all the cool stuff in Boston, made me dinner, I decided early on he was the one.

A year later we moved to Brooklyn, I had gotten my first advertising job in New York, and Phil joined me in New york shortly thereafter. The years took their toll on the relationship, I'd had a sexual awakening in the halls of my ad agency, everyone was dirty, drunk a lot of the time, and fun. Philip and I had grown apart, he was working nights at The River Cafe, I was working days. I offered him a chance to work on things, to get counseling, he took a pass - he wasn't much for communicating, so we both moved on. Many moons after that, Wendy resurfaced, turns out she lived in Brooklyn, too, she friended me on Facebook. Her profile picture seemed as though it was professionally shot. It was showing off her new husband, a very wasp-y looking man. It was a close up of them on a sailboat, gazing into each other's eyes, apparently she'd ditched the Levi's and flannel, and possibility the beige panties judging by the look of longing in her Wasp's eyes. I commented on the photo, "Very romance novel!!" She de-friended me immediately, but that was always the way with us, Wendy and I could never find our groove.

I don't think of Allston much, I lived there for all of a couple of months. But every time I see an overflowing ashtray, a used condom in the street, or a tray full of lingering tater tot grease I look back with a certain fondness and vow to never, ever go back there again.

WORTHY

2012-01-09T12:19:00.000-08:00

You look at me like a miracle;
don’t wanna let you down.

Sending me a love song
that’s hard for me to hear.

You say I saved your life
while I look down at the floor.

Or put it in a love letter;
was this thing meant for me.

All you ask is that I hold you
but you deserve much more.

If only I could love myself
as sweetly as you love me.

MY BIGGEST LESSON

2011-12-16T07:54:00.000-08:00

You grew up on the wrong side of Brooklyn
saving up for your house in the country since you were 10

You write “your” instead of “you’re”
in the most eloquent letter I’ve ever read

I know you’re not a rich guy
but you make damned sure I feel loved

To think I might have dissed you
my biggest lesson in love

YOUR TO-DO LIST

2011-10-03T20:34:00.000-07:00

You’re spread too thin
they call and you come
just one last favor
your version of fun

Mr. Fix-Her-Upper
you now gotta run
“Whatever, it’s fine”
‘till I’m finally done

Go re-pot her plants
go spackle her cracks
Then you want me nekkid?
Don’t even aks!

This feels kind of weird
ya don’t wanna hear it
you say as you leave
your baby mom’s therapist

I tried to be cool
tell myself you’re too nice
but I know that it’s just
your detaching device

So go and get handy
with damsel on line 2
this is me hanging up
on your list of to-do's

LOSS

2011-09-24T20:35:00.000-07:00

Such harrowing sorrow
for one so young.
Her dog taken this morning,
now she sleeps with the loss.

A woman sells a ring,
a loss forces the sale.
She sells it online, under
“mewithoutyou”

Loss loves a party;
my friend,
her daughter,
their just rescued dog.
A stranger selling a ring.
A father losing his job.

These losses remind me
of my dad dying young,
my mom’s distant memory,
my name lost in the fog;
all lost
in this loss.

THE MOTORCYCLE AND THE BITCHY VAGINA

2011-09-14T17:13:00.000-07:00

I don’t know why it got under my skin, but it did; this piece this chick wrote about her vagina getting sore riding around on the back of her boyfriend’s sport bike. The boyfriend posted the piece on his website, a very cool, popular motorcycle website, and he was very proud. Her main visual was of that area, in leather riding pants, with an X made of bandages covering her venus. It was a plea to the major motorcycle manufacturers, to please take vaginas into consideration when designing the back of the seat where women ride “bitch”. She was bitching about her vagina, and it bothered me to no end.

It’s hard enough fighting all the stereotypes about women being weak, complaining, not tough enough to participate in the sport without a woman complaining that her vajayjay is sore. Bikes aren’t Barcaloungers, they vibrate, the seats often lack padding, particularly sport bikes which are designed for speed, not comfort, and certainly not passengers. There are Goldwings, and oversized Harley-Davidsons for those who like a more livingroom riding experience. And here she was crying that Ducati isn’t babying her labia.

But the boys that read the piece and commented seemed to love it. Her boyfriend posted it on his motorcycle site’s Facebook page, there were a lot of, “way to go, Ashlee”s, I think the boys were lapping up her repetitive use of the word “labia”. There were also a lot of, “well-writtens!” I had never once seen a guy say “well-written” about any her boyfriend’s articles. It was if they were saying, “Wow, I love a gal who can talk publicly about her privates, and throw it all together in some proper paragraphs.” She’d come up with different names for her whiny vagina, like “cooch” and “lips” and more I can’t recall. She must have had a copy of Roget’s Clitorous Thesaurus on hand.

I wanted to bitchslap that vagina. Tell it to stop whining, get off the back of her boyfriend’s bike and ride her own. I wanted to rip those bandages off her V, and tell her to put her big boy panties on, stop riding the coattails of her boyfriend’s blog, and start her own.

Damned if I could put that bruised vagina article behind me; her boyfriend kept mentioning her on his FB page, “sorry I’ve been away, I’m trying to spend more time with Ashleeee.” OK. Now that you have a real live girlfriend, with a real live vagina we have to hear about it ad nauseum. He carefully worked a mention into almost every sport bike news piece he had written lately. Seems the vagina had him pussy whipped.

Then today he posted another article on Facebook and somehow managed to shout out his vag-chronicler. “I took Ashlee with me today to go check out the protective gear on the marketplace.” I get it. You have a girlfriend, you took her AND her vagina out for his n hers reflective jackets. I should have let it go, but that Vandaid visual had really stuck in my craw. I clicked on “comment” and let it pour from my lips, the ones on my mouth. “Don’t forget to stock up on vagina bandages!!” It was snarky, I knew it was wrong, but like a vagina pressed against the buzz of a Ducati seat, it felt so right.

RELUCTANT HERO

2011-09-11T16:31:00.000-07:00

They ordered you to stay put,
but you ran over the bridge,
straight into the fire.

They told you to go home,
yet you stayed three days,
without any sleep.

I call you a hero,
but you wave it off
with a “who, not me.”

NY honors their heroes,
you say, “I just don't get it,
we were just doing our jobs.”

SELF-INFLICTED

2011-07-24T15:20:00.000-07:00

You won’t be defamed,
But it’s your first rule of defense.

You say “I’m a target”
but transfixed by a gun.

Calling everyone crazy,
to a shrink that concurs.

You’re always the victim,
But who’s on the attack?
He’s ruthless and huge
and looks oddly like you.

Sending away "the enemy" you once called "friends"
So they run -
from love,
to still caring,
to gone - no forwarding address.

So go on your way,
marching to your own drum.
Heading off to your narcissist’s party,
putting your spin on events.

Or jot it down in a letter,
send it off to your friends.
The list growing shorter,
And it’s always on them.

You write so eloquently
with the pen that bleeds out.
The wound self-inflicted
etched in black on your chest.

MCDONALDS AND THE CREATIVE DIRECTOR

2011-07-20T18:23:00.000-07:00

She had insisted every night for the last two months that we had to work late, usually until ten-thirty, eleven. Elizabeth was my boss, I looked across at her, just letting her speak. We were in the basement of McDonalds, again, I was watching her indulge in her nightly Big Mac and large fries, the tears starting to run down her perfectly made up face.

I really liked Elizabeth. She was bright, articulate and funny, but she was sucking the life out of me. She could sure nurse a Diet Coke, late night there in that Micky-D’s where we usually had the basement all to ourselves.

She was my direct boss, she was supposed to be my creative director. Her job was to partner me, the writer, with an art director and oversee our work - but early on she’d snatched me up for herself. She nicknamed me “Crafty,” always generous with the praise; the fact was, I enjoyed working with her immensely during normal business hours. But around 4PM each day her office phone would start ringing off the hook. Soon her cell phone would pick up the slack. “Oo. That’s Pauls,” she called her husband ‘Pauls’, “Just ignore it.” But it was difficult. The two phones would ring back-n-forth solidly for about an hour before he would finally give up. I heard her on the phone with him one day, explaining to him how he just didn’t understand her dedication, actually hanging up on him mid-sentence, turning to me. “He said ‘it’s only ADVERTISING’,” can you believe it?” I was kind of on Pauls’s side, we were selling underarm deodorant, for God’s sakes. And it wasn’t like we weren’t churning out about eight storyboard ideas a day during regular office hours. Yet, if I dared to pick up my bag around seven she’d stop me, “where ya going, Crafty!” Around eight she’d ask if I was hungry, and even though I was pretty sure my dog had peed and pooped my apartment and was starving to death, I’d accept her dinner invitation – a table for two in the basement of the McDonalds across the street for a dinner of burgers, fries, and sobbing over her failing marriage. Pauls was a drinker. He’d agreed to a 12-step program, he had been doing better as of late, but she had received phone calls from strangers at bars, asking her to come pick him up. He’d lost his job, had a couple of DUI’s under his belt; she had to retain an expensive lawyer to manage the damage. She’d tell me these stories that almost always ended in tears, sometimes sobbing to the point where I would have to fetch extra napkins for her from atop the garbage receptacle so she could wipe away her tear-streaked mascara.

I usually ordered the kid’s meal, I was sure my cholesterol was topping off at around 550 by now from our now every night tradition. I’d finish my Jr. meal in short order but would have to sit there patiently for at least an hour, sometimes more, waiting for her to finish her straggling fries and stories. A lone worker would come down to wipe tables, gravely pull a mop across the floor – he’d nod at me sadly, we were regulars.

Weeks went by. I’d overhear her talking to Pauls on those rare occasions when she would pick up the phone, often at my urging. He had been sober for two years except for his benders that would happen every four months or so. He sounded so sweet, I could often hear him pleading for her to come home, he’d made a nice dinner. I’d have a glimmer of hope that I could make it home before the sun set that night, before my dog had pooped and peed and starved to death as we “worked” the night away, but that night never came. Elizabeth always took my hand and walked towards the soft glow of the golden arches.

More time passed and nothing much had changed until one day I had a blow out with our big boss, Juliani. He had moved to the United States from Italy over 30 years ago, but clung to his accent, I supposed he thought it gave him an air of creativity. He had a mouth full of marbles delivery, waving his hands, shaking his long bangs out of his eyes, giving the impression that he was saying something of importance, though you could never actually make out any words let alone sentences – just a bunch of “you know’s’ between garbled, unintelligible creative directorship. He had come this far by his good looks, designer suits, an expensive watch, and not much else. I knew because I used to partner with him, back when I was just a kid, and he was mid-career. Our arrangement was simple. I would come up with the ideas, and he would present them, the client often calling him a “genius” – praise he would wave off with euro-mumbles of feigned humility. Years later we were at the same agency again, he was now a big creative director, me, still a lowly writer. My insistence on wearing Hanes men’s undershirts and jeans to the office, coupled with my call-‘em-like-I-see-‘em je ne sais quoi had kept me permanently planted at the bottom of the agency food chain. Two days after he brought me into his group he started parading my ideas upstairs to his boss claiming them as his own. He was kind of a genius after all – a master thief who had honed his skills in disparaging everyone around him. And on that particular day he had launched an email campaign blacklisting an illustrator who happened to be a guy I was also dating. The boyfriend/illustrator had a hard time translating Juliani’s mouth full of marbles Italian and he’d made a mistake on one of the frames. Juliani was angered, muttering in Italian, as he composed a letter blackballing the gifted illustrator to the entire creative department. “He eez STOOPEEED, I doon’t like dees guyz.” We had worked with him for months, he’d always done a great job, but Juliani was angered that the communication breakdown had resulted in making him late for his 5:30 tennis match. I begged Juliani not to send the email, to think about it overnight. But he hit the “send” button like a virtuoso hitting the final chord of a concierto. I told him to go fuck himself, and a week later I was called into HR and “laid off” due to the company’s “financial hardship”. I packed up 20 years of crap into 5 cardboard boxes that were left outside my office and I was gone by midnight.

I spent the next three weeks living the life I’d always dreamed of. Nowhere to be, buzzing out to the beach in my Beemer, music blaring, windows down, sunroof open, the agency had cut me a check that would subsidize screwing around for at least two months. Yet, everyday my cell phone would ring. “Hey, Crafts. I miss you,” it was Elizabeth, about to make up for lost time – our late night McDonald’s rendezvous were now history. She was going on about Pauls like no time had passed, about Juliani, and what a thief and asshole he was, how her sister’s dog was sick, and would probably have to be put down to “sleep”. She would often catch me when I was in the “zone” – cruising back from the beach, from eating a lobster tail, or sipping a nice glass of wine on the water. Yet, every time she’d call I would pull over, often driving behind a shopping mall in a parking lot to get better reception, to lend an ear. I didn’t have the heart to cut her off. And she had some good news. She’d been interviewing for a big job at another big agency on a very glamorous account and wanted to share her excitement with me, telling me every detail about the interview process, I would give her my undivided attention, parked there in a reception sweet spot, next to a dumpster at the back of a Stop n Shop. A week later she called to say she’d gotten the job – it was the last time I ever spoke to her.

I was sure she would take me with her; the job market was worse than I had expected. Agencies wanted younger, edgier creatives, luring them away with bags of money from smaller, more creative agencies where they were poorly paid. It was a rude awakening, but Elizabeth was my ace in the hole, after all – I was her “Crafty”. And now that she was running a huge international piece of business, surely she would have no time to cry over fries and Diet Cokes. But I would never find out. I called her several times at the new agency, left her cute voicemails, but she never took my calls, or returned a single message.

I recently thought about Elizabeth, what had become of her? I wondered if she was still at the big agency, if she had lured another young writer into the depths of a different McDonalds. Was she still married to the precariously sober husband? Had there been a funeral for her sister’s dog? A recruiter friend of mine had done a search and found she had not only left the big agency, but had left advertising all together. She’d up and moved to Seattle, and started a clothing company with her sister who was a wealthy lawyer who had a penchant for painkillers and red wine. She had told me all about her – and their strict Catholic upbringing, how their father had walked out one morning and never returned only to shame them all by making a fortune in the porn business, how their mother worked hard to support them and then would cry herself to sleep at night. So many stories, so many lost nights, there, in the soggy, subterranean warmth of the McDonalds – the one across the street from the ad agency where we worked.

FOLLOW ME INTO NORMALCY

2011-06-23T16:57:00.000-07:00

The inception of claudtalks coincided with the beginning of a relationship with a biker. No details were off limits, dicey content drove my viewership over the top. Sex in the bushes on the side of the highway, S&M costumes, dicey evenings tweaked by mental illness, and much, much more. After I awoke from the cloud of excitement and compromised sanity that was my relationship, I was left holding an empty pen.

Is a story worth reading without sex, drugs, and dirty words? The content waxed and waned. I went from writing entries almost every day, to once a week, then twice a month, until I got to – whenever.

My views quickly went from triple digits, to 15, to 9, and sometimes 3. People searching the word “sex” in blog search windows would no longer find me. Could I write a piece about riding an Italian scooter and somehow work in the word “anus”?

I spend mornings looking out my window at the stunning view of the Verrazano Bridge, and contemplate new story ideas. I jot down a myriad of ideas over coffee - some of them sordid, some sweet, none of them making it on to the blog. The truth is, the validation wasn’t there. If a blog falls in the forest and no one is around to read it, does it even exist?

“No one cares,” I told my man friend when he inquired about my lack of writing. Even he had stopped reading after being traumatized by my indiscreet details about relationships with other men. Other readers had drifted away in the blogosphere.“No one cares” was not a self pity-party, it was simply fact.

I hadn’t bothered to check my blog in a few weeks until today, and much to my surprise I’d steadily gained a few followers. No crazy through the roof numbers, but a few solid followers nonetheless. All without so much as a mention of a spanking, or an eightball of coke. The new stories were about nothing in particular, the small stuff. A ride on a motorcycle, a visit to my mom’s assisted living residence, the this-and-that of everyday life. No saucy key words to entice, just simple stories about the pretty quiet life of a middle-aged chick, and interestingly, it seems to be enough to my new friends. My mind still accesses those extreme tales of my past as I look out my window every morning, but I’m feeling a want to stay in the present right now. My ponderings lack the bravado of 2009. They ring in an era of honesty - stories around sadness, boredom, hope, and occasional glee. And now that I see that a couple of strangers are watching, I might be inclined to jot a few of them down.

THE GROOM

2011-06-06T14:35:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow,
in a church filled with flowers and clenched smiles
they’ll all come together for the secret hating of the groom.

Over pie,
the family share their hopes for their daughter
to get away from him, but she’s already gone.

Earlier,
he dragged her out before dessert
the car ride home, he rattles, berates, degrades.

In hours,
she’ll say, “I do” over the inner thoughts of every person in the room.

Forever,
hold your peace at the secret hating of the groom.

THE DEALBREAKER

2011-05-19T13:19:00.000-07:00

He asked me for my number right from the seat of his Harley that Sunday in Coney Island, it was mere seconds into our phone conversation the next day before my devil-may-care decision was shadowed with regret.

“I hope you ain’t a crazy or a total retart like the last few women I dated,” that was his opener. Was it too early to end the conversation? I was dumb struck, I barely got out my “Nooo, no retart here” before he picked up the baton and ran with it. “This one, right? She’s a whale, and she’s wearin’ these spandex things, and her legs are FAAAT like I’m in Vinnie's Sausage Factory.”

“Hmn, that sucksss,” I replied, politely. He continues “So, I decide, what the f*ck, I’ll give it a shot, her face isn’t bad so I take her to dinner a few times,” he pauses to cough up last night’s pack of Camels, then threads his next thought on the tail of the expectorated phlegm, “long story short I broke up with her and THIS is why you have to call me from an unblocked number so I know it’s not her callin’, she keeps callin’ wantin' to git back wit me.” Now I was intrigued, why, after feeding her sausage thighs on several proper dinner dates, would he suddenly call it quits? He explained, “She got this kid, right. He’s 5, and she brought him on our third date so we could get acquaintit and I’m like WO, I din sign on for this so I tell her that I don’t see myself raisin’ some kid, plus she lived right under the Williamsburg Bridge, you ever been ‘round there, what a SH*Thole.”

I took my opening for my exit, “Goodness, that really is unfortunate,” but my gentleman caller put my plan on hold. “Wait – it gets better - so she begs me to go out wit her one more time to break up wit her in person or whatever - so I go and tell I’m not wanting a kid like I told her before and she says ‘no problem’”

“Great! It's good you were clear...” I say, attempting to end our session on an up note, again I'm interrupted.

“Wait - then she gets real serious and says to me ‘it's no problem, I been thinking. I'll just give him up for adoption.’”

I couldn't have heard him correctly.

“Right??!!," he said translating my silence, "I was like who the f*ck does that?? So I dropped her off home and she's been calling me ever since. Her mom called me up yesterday and wanted to know why I broke things off and I told her it wasn’t the kid, it was the whole puttin' the kid up for adoption that was it for me, right?” That was his dealbreaker, he said, before he inhaled deeply through his deviated septum to prepare for what would never materialize into the rest of his life's story. “So. Whadelse you wanna know about me.”

ALWAYS REMEMBER - a letter to my Mom

2011-05-08T14:52:00.000-07:00

Dear Mom,
We were all in denial about what was happening to you. You started repeating things a lot, and became increasingly disoriented. I remember walking along the water in La Jolla when you still lived there, it was the first time I noticed a vacant look in your eyes. Now that I look back, this was when I probably realized something was wrong. I put both my hands on your shoulders, as if to wake you and said, “Mom! Mom!!” so we could laugh it away. You mirrored me with a vague giggle, but said, “I’m tired Honey, let’s go home.”

It took Kath, Mike’s wife, to say we should bring you in for testing. We resented her for bringing it up, nothing was wrong with our Mom, you were going to the gym twice a week, delivering meals to people with AIDS, going to dinner with friends. But on our visit, you said we were going to meet your friend, Belle, at that big burger and nacho restaurant with the Surfboard logo and Belle never showed up. I said we should call her but you waved it off and ordered enough food for an army and finished it off, and then ordered dessert. You used to get an appetizer and say it was way too much food. I was leaving for New York the next morning, you asked me over and over and over again what time my flight was, I tried to wrangle the pullover you’d been wearing for a week straight away from you to throw it in the wash, but you became so stubborn about it so I just let it go. A couple of weeks later Rob said the two of you were taking a drive up to the top of Mount Soledad and you turned to him and asked if you were in California or Connecticut.

After taking you to the doctor, they took away your car keys. Mike packed a bag for you that day and brought you back to Portland with him. It was as if you had your life on Wednesday, and on Thursday you would never have it back again. They found a lovely place for you, and bring the grandkids by on Sundays. You found a boyfriend, who would have thunk it, you’re no Spring chicken, but he’s so handsome, and funny, a retired Marine that looks at you like you’re the most precious treasure in the world.

And you are. Even now, more than ever – you are a great inspiration to me. “I never let things get me down,” you say every day when I call. You never did. You had a crazy mother, she used to drive me insane but you would tell me, “she doesn’t get to me, it all goes in one ear and out the other,” you’d say – matter of factly. Then you’d get back to unpacking the van after coming home from whatever antiques show you were doing that weekend.

I thank God you still remember who we all are, one time I called, you sounded confused, I said, “Mom, this is Claudia.” You snapped, “I know!” As though it was an absurd thought that you wouldn’t know the sound of your own daughter’s voice. But one day this could very well be the case. So I’m telling you now, dear Mother, on today - this Mother’s Day: always remember how very much I love you.

SUMMER GIRL ROMANCE

2011-04-30T10:11:00.000-07:00

I messed around with a girl once. Well, to be honest, maybe it was more than once. She seduced me on my terrace one summer night, long black hair falling around my face as she leaned in and kissed me, after she slipped her hand up my shorts. We’re just the kind of gals that rub lesbians the wrong way. Bi-curious, or just human, it happened a couple more times. I think she was bipolar or something, she woke from a nap on my sofa one day and went berserk. Screaming in my face that I should have woken her up, that she was late, to where, I knew not. She stormed out, slammed the door and that was the last time we spoke.

Now she’s married with kids and a nice husband. She moved to Omaha, put on a few pounds, and makes a nice dinner every night for the family. I wonder if she ever thinks about those days way back when, when she used to dance in her bra and panties to Janet Jackson in my living room.

HANGING AT YOUR HOUSE

2011-04-12T11:43:00.000-07:00

Staring out the window at your place
Tree pods shiver in the rain
Hanging on, hanging on

You’re downstairs tinkering again
I hear you like a favorite CD
Hanging on, hanging on

This house will be sold this weekend
I remember when it was a shell
Hanging on, just hanging on

COUPLE CHARACTERS

2011-04-03T21:24:00.000-07:00

It took a split second to go from “he’s hot” to Code Orange. From inside the bar I could see him stumbling around outside. White ribbed sweater showing his defined chest, expensive jeans, hanging on to the side of the building for dear life before he composed himself enough to roll through the front door of the restaurant. Jose, the owner, greeted him as an apparent regular, though I’d never had the pleasure to make his acquaintance. It was early Sunday night, I was the only one in the place - the disturbed hunk took the seat right next to me. His scent had the intensity of a car airfreshener, he was bathed in booze and chain smoking. Jose spoke to him like he was any normal patron even though the young man had trouble stringing thoughts together. Jose slammed down a beer in a bottle, the scented gent downed it like Gatorade, Jose was there to enable with what would become a six pack in the next hour or so.

He was a Marine – his stumbling along the side of the building may have been explained by his broken hip, a souvenir he brought back from Irag – topped off with a combo of pain killers, self medications, and lord knows what else may have explained his precarious gate. “Honorable Discharge,” he raised a finger, he now worked for the city’s big phone company. He still had military clearance, Jose bragged that my new bar friend was the guy they called to rig the phone system when the president was in town. The president’s go to phone guy slipped off to the bathroom and reappeared, steadying the inanimate barstool to make sure it was safe before he slid himself back on.

The beer seemed to be waking him up. He told a story about his phone company and a service call he had up in Riverdale. “This Jewish lady” wouldn’t let him in. He had showed up to the repair appointment in the body hugging ribbed white sweater, and expensive jeans he was wearing now, even though the story took place a few days ago. The Jewish lady had sent him away even though he presented her with the company's photo ID. When he got back to headquarters his supervisor put the disgusted customer complaint on speakerphone. “I didn’t realize that Ventron was hiring homeless people,” she snapped. It seemed the guys at Ventron had a good laugh over that one, his “uniform” of body hugging clothes, badly bleached hair, and Eau du Camels didn’t warrant so much as a slap on the wrist. “Dude, don’t they have a uniform you can wear or something,” Jose was trying to help with some sound advice. The compromised soldier waved the comment off like an invisible mosquito was targeting his face.

A woman walked in, I had seen her at the place a couple of times, she was pretty, had a ready smile and a nice energy, she walked up to the discharged Marine and kissed him sweetly on the cheek like he was her hard working husband getting off the 5:02 train to Greenwich. She seemed oblivious to the stench he was putting out, or the fact that he was barely holding it together. Introductions were made, he slid one seat over, opening a seat up between us for his lovely wife.

Turns out she owned a bar on Brooklyn, she’d come from Ireland years ago, she and “Joe”, her husband, had been married ten years. I quickly turned my attention back on my sangria to hide my disbelief. Joe was nodding off, but would inject sudden epiphanies, Tara, his wife, would place her hand on his shoulder and say, “excuse me, Honey, what was that?” like he had something important to add, two staccato hiccups punctuated his fragmented thought.

Tara was engaging, John was going in and out of some form of consciousness, it was like the children had gone off to bed, Tara told me a story about getting her Blackberry back after losing it somewhere in the city. “I used my ex-girlfriend’s name on MY number, they called her, but it was me.” She looked for my reaction - it was confusion. John briefly woke up and did his best Greek Chorus impression, heralding, “SHE HAD A GIRLFRIEND! SHE HAD A GIRLFRIEND!!” and hiccupped again before narrowing his eyes on the beer in front of him like it was prey he would need to be very clever to capture.

Tara and I talked about people we knew from the neighborhood, the freaks, the legendary characters, one of them a gorgeous 30 something in the hood with considerable psych issues and an eating disorder to boot. John piped up, “IS SHE HOT? WOULD I LIKE HER, HONEY?!!” Tara didn’t miss a beat, “No, Baby. She’s crazy, crazy like you. You like together girls to balance your crazy. Don't you.” It was hard to imagine any “together” girl seeing John datable or even f*ckable – but John blinked twice for yes in response to his wife’s assessment of the bulimic girl in question.

The bartender/owner Jose had been plying me with free drinks but I felt the evening coming to a close. It was that feeling like you have to throw up but want to be in the comfort of your own home to do it, the couple showed no signs of leaving. When I stood up, John in a miraculous burst of energy jumped to attention to help me on with my jacket. It was a stunning gesture of chivalry at the end of a dicey impromptu evening. “Hey, I don’t know what you’re doing," he leaned into my ear, "but you could come home with us, we dabble in – “ “Stop right there,” I graciously declined the yet defined offer, “whatever it is you dabble in, let that be YOUR secret.” “Yes, Honey,” Tara smiled at her man, and winked at me.

I couldn’t wait to get home and wash my face, wash off the soldier turned Ventron tech, his stench, his wife, their offer. Yes, soap - a nightcap was definitely in order.

SPRINGTIME FOR CLOWNS

2011-03-24T09:48:00.000-07:00

The text came in around 7PM on Sunday. “I miss you,” he said, and some other well- chosen words to make me get all warm and fuzzy inside my vag*na. “Time for a little glass half empty,” my brother turned to me, knocking off my rose colored glasses in the process. Still, I was trying to think what panties I had put on before I went out for the evening should the evening take an interesting turn. It seems I spent the entire year turning down sex. Repeated home visits from the 25 year old that I eventually had to terminate, constant come-ons from Cal who finally said he loved me after 10 years, then took someone else out for dinner the following Friday. Nothing made me feel stronger than turning down sex with men who do nothing to deserve it - but by Spring I realized that not putting out equals not getting anything in and “it” was reaching its breaking point. Simple eye contact with a nice looking guy on Henry Street drove an electric current from between my legs, up my body, and escaped as blue smoke from the top of my head. Biology was winning this battle - what's a girl to do.

The biggest, shiniest, newest Harley I’d ever seen was parked in front of the diner. Cal was coming to meet me, but I wondered who was steering this ship. The biker appeared, rounding the corner – goatee, café racer jacket, about 5’9” – he was quick to engage over his beast of a bike. Daytona, cross-country trips, year round road warrior, blah, blah, blah. I saw Cal out of the corner of my eye head into the diner, and it made me realize what the pint sized biker on the monster Harley was missing. He had not stopped talking since he walked up, hadn’t paused to ask a question, hadn’t taken a breath to hear my clever retorts. Cal was waiting inside the diner for me, he would ask me what I’d been up to, what I thought about things, he actually gave a hoot. This little conversationalist could never stroke me between the ears, surely he'd have a heck of a time reaching other bits of my anatomy.

Seems it's time for Spring cleaning. Out go the rose colored glasses. All mixed messages tossed in the trash. Oh, and no sex for solillaquists – toot your own horn! All clowns, the lot of ‘em. And that thing they say about men who wear big shoes - behind that big bulge is a lot of hot air – hardly what a girl needs to get the job done right.

THE GENTLEMAN FROM BAY RIDGE

2011-02-28T18:49:00.000-08:00

The Jamesons had started working it’s magic, my date was starting to open up; “I mean, the guy said, ‘Hey, Cracka’ - a course I'm gonna call you Ni**a,” he paused to try to get a read on my reaction, “I’m right, Right? I mean ‘Cracka’ is white for “Ni**a”, right?”

It wasn’t horror I was feeling, I felt more let down, I had met other gentlemen from Bay Ridge; this was fairly typical subject matter. Yet, I was seriously considering my date’s query - turning it over in my mind, was calling someone a ‘Cracka’, in fact, the equivalent of calling someone a ‘Ni**a”?

Jimmy’s re-enactment of the afternoon continued; him, just minding his own business when this black guy walks up and calls him a Cracker. The two went back and forth discussing the gravitas of “cracka” vs. the “N” word, the award going to the one who had slighted less, strangely enough. In a final attempt to settle everything in one felt swoop, my date recounted addressing the fellow one last time, “shut up or I will bitch slap you like the bitch you are,” he said it to the guy very casually, like he was letting him know his shoe was untied, but it seemed to settle things as “Bitch” trumps all. He shrugged and took another long sip of Jamesons staring straight ahead.

The stuff that had drawn me to him, the muscles, the ink, were all hidden under his neatly pressed Yankees shirt now, which made the racial slur seem more pronounced, he had the face of a choir boy. He made an honest living, had a good job, taught himself how to cook up a storm since the separation - Doritos breaded chicken breasts to Lobster Thermidor - he carried a wallet sized photo of his small fluffy dog he bought for company, and had a boss motorcycle he loved to ride, what’s not to love. But when he asked if I wanted to stay for dinner, I asked Jimmy to drop me home. “You had me at “Ni**a”, I thought hours after our date, wasn't that always the way. But my humor would have been lost on Jimmy, that, and he's racist - that's what I told myself as I deleted the half naked pictures Jimmy had sent me after our date, my heart sinking deeper as my chances of getting with a real live naked guy looking less and less likely with each click of the delete button.

THE DARKER TIMES OF PASTOR RAY

2011-02-15T15:35:00.001-08:00

I first met Pastor Ray when he was a bartender, way before he was a man of the cloth, back when I worked as a writer on Madison Avenue. We had an immediate, electrifying attraction – I learned in later years, a red flag heralding you to run the other way. He was handsome, dynamic, a punk musician, a drunk, and an Army Private. He invited me out for drinks after his shift, and I left him standing on 3rd Avenue at 3 AM, screaming after my cab, “I fucking LOVE YOU, and you don’t GIVE A SHIT!!”

During our impromptu date, he casually mentioned he had a girlfriend, but we continued chatting as friends at the bar he tended after that, he brought me his punk albums, and showed me some pretty engaging writing he was doing, one involved a story about a girl who gave him head in a parking lot while deployed, the story hinged around the girl's mouthful of metal railroad track braces - the excruciating pain that followed, ending with a quirky vignette with hilarious details around his failed attempts to release his manhood from her silver interior.

Ray and I were in and out of each other’s lives for years, when he became single he got in touch with me. He’d since become a recording engineer and worked at one of the best places in the city. He’d always had a deep bravado to his voice, a macho swagger that women of poor judgment find captivating. We had dinner those few years later, and he still seemed the same, but also not. Something else was in the mix that I couldn’t put my finger on. This time he left me on the street early instead of the other way around like years before, which left me wondering. He told me I looked great, kissed me quickly on the lips, and hailed a cab, hightailing it out of there just barely after 9 pm.

I didn’t hear from him for a couple of weeks, until one day he called, saying the recording studio he was working at was having a Halloween party. I showed up, Ray looked like death - on top of the fact that this was his costume, black shawl, hood, black makeup that created cavernous sockets around his dead, reddened eyes. I saw him peak out behind a screen, but when he saw me he ducked away. I went away confused and wondering what had gone wrong.

A few days later, I got a voicemail at my office, it was a friend of Ray’s telling me that he had O.D.’d on heroin. It had happened in his apartment - he’d been passed out on the floor for two days, he was lucky to be alive. There was a possibility that his leg would have to be amputated – it had twisted back awkwardly in the fall, the two days he was passed out had taken its toll on his appendage.

I reconnected with Ray during his recovery, he told me that Jesus had saved his life, and his leg in the same turn. His faith was astonishing, soon he was on the church scene with the same vigor I'd seen in his punk rock days, publishing controversial themes designed to rock the Christian world. We lost touch when he enrolled in a theological seminary after a brief romantic encounter between us that left Ray convinced he should swear me off, along with his slew of pre-O.D. bad habits. I’d heard he had met a woman who was also in seminary, married her, and they started a congregation in an impoverished town somewhere in Pennsylvania, doing “important work” with the people who struggled just to survive there.

When I friended him on Facebook two years ago, he was a well respected Pastor, happily married with 3 lovely children. Through the Army, Ray went to Afghanistan on a spiritual mission, and had written a book which he forwarded me for feedback. I always knew he was passionate - whether he was a punk musician, writing descriptive blowjob prose, doing heroin, or leading parishioners, Ray was always rockin’ it at eleven.

Recently, I took the time to listen to one of Pastor Ray’s spiritual podcasts. Although we’d talked occasionally in email, I hadn’t heard his deep, maniacal voice in over a decade. But when I clicked on play- the man I heard was not Ray, but some ethereal version of himself. His voice was quiet, his tone earnest - his delivery plain. Ray had been reborn - it seemed quite literally. There was no resemblance to Ray of past times, his wild animation gave way to gentle expressions that seemed to emanate from a slow burning flame nestled inside his heart - my goodness, I thought, God does work in mysterious ways. Ray is living proof of that. I was fortunate to bare witness along his wild, winding road - from railroad track braces and Streetcar Named Desire nights, to Needle Park, into the ambulance and on into the New York Presbyterian E.R., soon taking flight at the theological seminary, until he eventually landed, preaching high atop the internet mount. Ever so humbly, this is where I first heard Pastor Ray, quoting scripture, spreading The Word to those who will listen.

SEVEN

2011-02-15T09:51:00.001-08:00

1.
Saying “I love you” is not a bargaining chip.
It’s a feeling you pay forward with love and respect.

2.
Saying “I’m sorry” isn’t a way back in.
It’s a desire to do better next time.

3.
“We” isn’t “Me”. Well, it’s sort of “we”, but the “w” got flipped over in the wake of those scurrying towards self-serving stuff.

4.
Making love is not something you get in exchange for scrambled eggs or a steak dinner – that is what is known as a “transaction”, often becoming more costly post transaction – resulting in a lost friendship, STD, or an unwanted pregnancy; the trifecta of thoughtless encounters.

5.
Sex is a gift you receive from someone’s soul, as well as their vagina.
Treat both with the utmost care. If not, refer to #4.

6.
Lies are the stories people tell themselves right before they tell you, often to support their own agenda.

7.
One person’s idea of a “relationship” is usually different from another's. It’s not yours, or theirs, it’s often somewhere in the middle, like a seesaw. If you find yourself playing with yourself, it’s probably because you don’t know the basic rules of physics/relationships.

A VALENTINE FROM www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/

2011-02-14T20:28:00.000-08:00

These are excerpts from a Valentine's Day blogpost on Baggage Reclaim, an extraordinary blog for women who are seeking a healthy relationship, but have previously gone about it ass backwards. This has been reprinted without the author's permission, I am not the author, just an ardent fan, and suggest you subscribe to Baggage Reclaim, it will turn your head around.

(baggagereclaim content- edited)

Valentine’s Day: Notes On Love From Me To You

by NML on February 14, 2011

Love is a wonderful thing…when you’re experiencing it. I believed that I’d loved several times prior to this relationship and it’s only through introspection and looking at a relationship with mutual love, care, trust, and respect versus a relationship with drama, pain, ambiguity.

One of the biggest lessons learned is that love doesn’t hurt.

Being in a shady relationship hurts,
doing things that bust up your boundaries hurts,
as does engaging in stuff that goes against values you profess to have or that has you feeling embarrassed and humiliated.

Love really isn’t all that dramatic. Being raised in a drama filled household means I used to be a real drama seeker and thought that the highs and lows signalled passion, excitement and chemistry. Actually, it signified pain and unhealthy relationships.

Love doesn’t make you do crazy stuff – drama does.

Sometimes I think we’ve stopped believing in love in a healthy guise. Believe it. Embrace it. The moment that you stop believing that love is out there for you, is the moment you give up on yourself. Love doesn’t just happen – even if you bump into The Most Perfect Person On Earth, you still need to work at it.

Happy Valentine’s day. Exhale, embrace, enjoy and if you’re finding it tough today, remember this day shall pass and don’t get hijacked by your feelings.

(End content from blog: baggage reclaim)
to read full content go to:
http://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/valentines-day-notes-on-love-from-me-to-you/#more-6011

Thanks to y'all who take the time to read my blog. To my friends, my family, to those whom I love, that love me back - and to those I have yet to meet... may we all get the love we want, and the wisdom to know how to give and receive it fully with an open, kind, and vulnerable heart - because it's so worth it. xo

MIDLIFE GANGSTAH WAYS

2011-02-12T22:11:00.000-08:00

Itchin for trouble
Just like de old days
No lines on the back of a toilet
Jus an extra piece of cheese on
Organic eggs
Wild night of chardonnay
Winking at that 20 year old
Like it was yesterday

BACK ON BEAUTY

2011-02-10T08:41:00.001-08:00

About a year ago I piled tons of expensive department store make-up into shopping bags, brought it down into my lobby, and sold it all for $175 dollars to a young makeup artist who found my listing on Craigslist.

As she opened all of the Chanel, Dior, and YSL quads, she looked as though her hands were running through a pot of gold coins she’d discovered under a bush. “Why are you selling all of this,” she looked up at me in utter disbelief. “I’m over it,” I said, it was true. I’d had a love/hate relationship with the face paint over the years. And it seemed there was no middle ground. Being blessed with beautiful skin, it enabled me to take a feminist view on the stuff. I hated that I spent so much time in high school applying the stuff in front of the mirror. If I only had the right Bonnie Bell lip stuff, my boyfriend wouldn’t have dumped me. Fast forward to my big job in advertising it had become a full on addiction. I was medicating with margaritas, men, and mega amounts of department store hauls. I had made “friends” with the girl at the Chanel counter at Lord and Taylor a block away from work. I’d go in for a lipgloss, and with her “friendly” guidance I’d leave with a quarter of my paycheck’s worth of shadows, mascaras, pricey creams, and more. I’d feel that crack-type high when I was on the purchase, often returning home with a bagful of self-loathing regret. I had yet to “hit pan” (the act of burrowing down through the blush or eyeshadow til you hit the metal) on any item, ever. But I always wanted more. Years later, I started to identify ways I was self-medicating. Food, watches, foundations, I decided to make a clean break and cut myself off from cosmetics completely and never looked back, until today.

I’ve been thinking about my relationship with beauty lately, and giving it a second look. I like how I look without makeup, but I was curious to reopen the issue, and the duos and blushes that go along with. Riffling down under my sink, I unearthed a box I’d missed during my purge to get rid of all the paint. There were a couple of the black, sleek compacts with that classic Chanel logo, I’d forgotten how good they feel in your hand, the smart click they make when you snap the lid shut. It was like riding a bike, I’d been studying makeup techniques since I was six, decades later I created a perfect, natural arched brow. A lone YSL blush proved to be the perfect color, and brightened my mood one cheek at a time. That afternoon, I went to my local CVS and bought a mascara that had been recommended online. With some of the eye shadows I found in this forgotten treasure chest of goodies, I created a natural looking eye. Like the Madison Avenue copywriters spun it, “You. Only better.” But it was true. I wasn’t 16 anymore, it was the dead of winter, and suddenly I looked like I’d had the best sex of my life the night before.
If I kept this up, maybe I’d be having the best sex of my life by next week. It was uplifting, outside and in.

Years ago, a feisty old man copywriter that I adored back in the day snuck up on me as I stood waiting to go into a meeting and whispered like Snidely Whiplash in my ear, “Got your war paint on, I see.” He had noticed that I’d ramped up my makeup that morning, said I hadn’t fooled him - the manhunt was on. I brushed it off as ridiculousness, but I remember it to this day. Makeup is just another weapon in your arsenal, as important as witty repartee, refined oral skills, and knowing just when to flip that perfect medium rare steak. And I’m good with all of that, and the rewards that come with.

Makeup used to be my crack, but if taken in moderation it can also be your Seroquel, providing a lift in mood and confidence, it can be war paint, or just worn around the apartment, either way, I've found that beauty isn’t the enemy.

A FEBRUARY NOTE

2011-02-09T14:53:00.001-08:00

I call my mother, she rarely picks up the phone. When she does, she sound disoriented, Dementia ravaging her brain. She sounds happy, for that I am thankful. I listen to her sound bites, I try to take her bum’s rush in stride.

My family has shape shifted over the years. My parents moved across the country 20 years ago, my father passed away shortly thereafter. My brother got married, had kids, and moved to Oregon and hasn’t made it back East since. I have dropped the ball, my visits out to Portland have been few and far between. His kids are a foot taller each time I visit. I try to make in into the city to see my other brother whenever he extends an invite. I watch him smoke a cigarette, I see it as a threat to one of my last remaining shreds of the family I once had.

I appreciate the friends I have, the ones that extend a hand as I cling to my alone time, that’s always been my way. Friends disperse as they pursue different interests than yours, move away, or simply drift. No one is to blame, we’re not in high school anymore - we’re not all sitting in the cafeteria giggling, or going out every Saturday night.
Seems sometimes, some of my closest friends are the ones I’ve never met.

I used to consider myself “independent”, but I’m feeling more disenfranchised as of late. A lone wolf not so much by choice, but more of a sentence by my own hand. I look at the men that I have loved and wonder how I could have assigned such a word to what actually was. I question the core friend I have in this life, the one I am to myself.

THANKS, TODAY

2011-02-07T20:24:00.001-08:00

My mechanic jumped me at a moment’s notice.
Po-po waved me on with a smile.
Girl drove from Jersey to buy my watch.
Two tens for a twenty without buying Twix.
The sun on my face on the walk to the store.
Deleted that blogpost before anyone saw.
The right purple shadow in the wrong slot.
Money in my pocket to buy what I got.

THE TALE OF THE PAPER SHREDDER

2011-02-04T11:17:00.000-08:00

I’m one of those people who are obsessed with everything best. I have to have the best pizza slice, the best Schnauzer, the best paper shredder.

It took me weeks to research my paper shredder, I finally went with the one designed by the world-renowned architect Michael Graves. He was designing stuff for Target, and it was getting a consistent 5 stars on their site, it was great looking, I went to Target to check it out in person and made her mine. That was probably 8 years ago.

It did the job well, and looked good doing it. No need to tuck in away in a closet. I’d had my identity stolen once, and took to shredding everything paper item short of unbranded tampon wrappers.

The last time I used her was after a major paper purge in my apartment. I was testing the Michael Graves Paper Shredder, pushing her to its limits. Getting rid of months of bank and Amex statements, back before the days we all went paperless. I’d do 5 pages, then 7, then 10. It worked like a champ. The device showed no signs of slowing down, I unplugged my piece of office sculpture and continued to pile paper aside to be shredded on my bi-annual shred fests.

Yesterday, in a rare burst of energy, I decided to shred every piece of paper in the apartment. I spent the morning separating papers that needed to be filed, and what needed to be shredded, made myself another cup of coffee, cracked my knuckles and prepared myself to shred.

I plugged Michael Graves in, but nothing. Not a peep out of my high design office helper. I fiddled with all the buttons, plugged her in/plugged her out a couple of times. Nada. Not exactly a hero’s death, Michael Graves was chewing through my statements with ease the last time I used her, then suddenly, she was all dried up? Had she died in her sleep?

I immediately went on Target dot com, there was no Michael Graves paper shredder in site. They only had the sad, lackluster black rectangular trashcans with uninspired shredders atop of them. This wouldn’t do. Few things depress me more than uninspired office supplies. The red Trimline stapler had been sold out for months after being immortalized in the movie, “Office Space” – clearly, I wasn’t the only one with a passion for high design tools for mundane tasks.

I couldn’t quite bring myself to take Michael Graves down to the basement to be put out with the plebeian trash. Should I salvage the curved black pail below the sleek, silver shredding device? I could re-purpose it for a dog food bin, or a midpoint rest station for paper between clutter and shredder, once she was replaced. But ugg, the replacement options weren’t viable. I walked over to breathe in her beauty one last time before I brought her down to the basement where she would meet her ultimate fate and be put out on the icy sidewalk next to the likes of ugly wired shelving, and broken particle board slabs awaiting their final resting place in Jersey, Staten Island, or the like.

“I can't,” I told myself, “I won't give up on her just yet!” Like a loved one on a ventilator, I couldn't pull the plug - so I plugged Michael Graves in one more time - my prayers still went unanswered. I picked up the shredder unit from his black plastic can, and gave it a little shake. I flicked all of the buttons every which way. I ran my fingers along the teeth inside the paper slot. Plugged her in, still a flatline. Yet, in a final desperate attempt, I gave her a violent SHAKE-SHAKE-SHAKE. I knocked her sleek silver exterior with my knuckles, sat down, and banged the device against the edge of my coffee table. I plugged her in again and a miracle occurred. There, in the center of her curved silver faceplate, the tiny green light shone bright. Like a tiny emerald gleaming out of the darkness of the defunct shredder - I reached for an old Merrill Lynch statement and fed it through her hungry lips. And voila! The monstrous sound of grinding was a concierto to my ears. I hadn’t given up on her, I hadn’t placed my order for her ugly step sister shredders, hadn’t banished her to the basement. All she needed was a swift banging, and Michael Graves was back in business, as beautiful and gifted as ever.

THE LOST YOUNG MAN

2011-02-03T11:59:00.000-08:00

This guy was really making me work for this 30 bucks. It was a $150 helmet I got when I picked up my Vespa – the girl that sold it to me gave me two helmets, a chain lock, a cover, and I was selling off the residual stuff on Craigslist to help recoup some of the top dollar money I had paid for the thing.

The guy was calling me every two minutes, he was only 8 blocks away, but it seemed when I said “take a right,” he would go left. He was getting all turned around - not the sharpest knife in the drawer. I reminded myself to be kind, and on the 5th incoming call, he said he was on my corner.

When I walked outside he was standing next to his bike, an old beat up Honda. He couldn’t have been older than 25 - looking from side to side - he seemed very disoriented. Dressed in full Army fatigues, apparently coming from someplace much further than Queens.

“Sorry, you seemed to get pretty lost on the way here,” I said, trying to break the odd silence. He was half inspecting the helmet, and flinching at sounds that the rest of us wouldn’t think twice about; the slamming of a car door, a neighbor calling to someone across the way. “Is it for you,” I tried again. He was muttering, “It’s O.K, O.K.,” I didn’t know if he was referring to his getting lost, the condition of the helmet, or simply comforting himself.

I asked him where he’d come from, Queens, East New York, Staten Island, he mustered a quiet response, “...back from Afghanistan.” He snapped out of his vacant stare, and reached for the 30 bucks he had neatly folded in his pocket.

“Is it for your girlfriend,” I longed to bring up a comforting notion. “Yeah,” he said quietly. “She must be happy you’re back safe 'n' sound,” I took the 30 from his hand, he hadn’t quite passed it to me. “don’t have a girl, in case I get one…,” his voice trailed off. I tried to engage him in a conversation about his bike, but it seemed like he couldn’t hear me, some kid had popped his gum and he was trying to recompose himself. “Late now,” he said in another sentence fragment, pushing the helmet under the netting on the passenger seat where a girlfriend would go.

“Hey,” I yelled over the sound of his engine, “lemme tell ya how to get back,” but he jerked forward onto Henry Street and disappeared into the hot August sun. I realized I didn’t know where “back” was, but I knew it would only a matter of time before he would be deployed again, shipped off at a moment’s notice to only God knows where.

FACEBOOK DE-FRIEND: THE NEW PASSIVE AGGRESSIVE

2011-01-30T13:39:00.000-08:00

Colder than an icy drink thrown in your face, without a word your “friend” de-friends you on Facebook.

My first de-friend came from a guy I was dating. Since then, we have friended, de-friended back and forth a myriad of times. Yes, we are no longer “friends”.

Then there was one of my best girlfriends from back in the day. She urged me to join Facebook, and I did. Two days later, I was friended by the guy I ended up dating, and de-friending, and friending again. But a year and a half later, my girlfriend who had urged me to join Facebook became angry with me. We were interacting on another marvel of modern communication technology – texting. She was getting hysterical about a situation. I urged her to calm down, in ALL CAPS. Now, all caps can seem like screaming, but my intention was to call attention to my message, to break through the steady stream of panicked texts she was firing my way. I fired off the ALL CAPS – “CALM DOWN”. The texts suddenly stopped. I tried to call her that afternoon, and the next day, but she wouldn’t pick up.

Finally, I decided to check her Facebook page, to see if her panic had made the journey from text messages to a status update, but when I clicked on her page – the page was blank. She had changed her privacy settings so that I couldn’t see anything on her page. All that was left was her grinning face, with her crocheted chapeau – the one an old boyfriend of hers had seen her wearing on Facebook and advised her looked like a flower pot atop her head. But I let it go, thought I’d let a couple of days go by and see if she’d let me back into her world of updates, which usually revolved around daily newsflashes about how many cigarettes and glasses of white wine she’d consumed that afternoon. A week later, I scroll through my friends, and she was nowhere to be found. My friend had de-friended me as a further ramped-up passive aggressive slap in the face. Still, I ignored it, I had tried to call her several times to discuss my all caps offense prior to her de-friending me, I wasn’t going to inquire why she’d de-friended me. I thought, this too shall pass.

Another month goes by, I check to see if she is still donning the flower pot crocheted cap, but my search for her on Facebook yields nothing. I check the pages of our common “friends”, zip. Suddenly I realized, she used the ultimate passive aggressive Facebook fete accompli – she’d blocked me from Facebook completely. I attempted to email her and as I suspected, she’d blocked me from contacting her at her two addresses. I did a search on Google, she no longer existed on the internet, therefore, on the planet - as far as my eyes could see.

I much preferred the days of open confrontation. Disagree, have a fight, hash it out, slug it out, whatever. But Facebook is the new ultimate silent treatment, the new anti-social de-networking tool. I’d love to tell my friend to “suck it,” to “grow the f’ up,” but I have no way to reach her. Facebook de-friending trumps all, if you want to send someone a message, there’s no better way than to block them on Facebook. The trick is try to de-friend them before they de-friend you, or beat them to the punch metaphorically - the good newfangled Facebook way.

THE SCOOTERATI

2011-01-27T13:54:00.000-08:00

Trying to fit in with the scooter club reminded me of why I dropped out of Girl Scouts: girls in clubs can be so mean.

It started when I finally decided to go to a meet up of my local scooter club in the meatpacking district. I had read a lot about them online – the club heads urged new scooterists to come by, “don’t be shy”. “Everyone’s welcome.”

It’s not easy walking into a place alone, especially when you're ascending on a club where everyone is already old friends. I rode up on my scooter and parked alongside all of the other member’s Vespa’s and “the like”. A bunch of the members were standing around outside the bar with their pints of beer. No one greeted me but what was I expecting, a marching band? I figured I’d give them a chance to warm up to me, so I made my way into the bar and got myself a beer. I looked around inside and much to my delight I noticed a woman who had been selling her scooter on Craigslist, I had met her a couple of weeks before when I’d gone to check it out. She was standing next to another girl rider. It was great to see a familiar face in the crowd, I walked over to the two women to say “hi” but was taken aback by their mean girl glances. I was back in the 4th grade, only the mean girls were close to forty, dressed as Mods, and instead of drinking school milk slighly through straws, they were sucking Screwdrivers through tiny cocktail stirrers and red stained lips. I mustered a feeble “hi”, they briefly glanced my way but abruptly turned their backs - apparently attending to some private club agenda - pressing their Betty Page heads together to make sure I couldn't hear.

I’d been meaning to go to this weekly meet up for months, had kicked my butt to take a shower, to fight rush hour traffic over the Brooklyn Bridge. I took another swig of my draft beer and went outside where the other members were gathered. Soon enough, the president of the club came over. “Hey, you’re new here,” he said warmly. He was a big, nice looking guy, he was into scooters, but also rode a motorcycle. He called a couple of guys over and introduced me, they were equally friendly. I was glad I’d come. Finally, the president called over one of the few females in attendance there at the weekly meet-up. “Honey, hey, this is Claudia – this is her first time here.” She muttered a “hey” without looking at me as she trailed over to join the amoeba of scooter club regulars.

Soon, the mean girl I knew from Craigslist appeared outside, she’d walked up to her new scooter; a red modern Vespa that she’d fitted with a black and white zebra print seat. Her red and black outfit color coded precisely to her pride-n-joy Vespa. “Hey,” I said, “I met you a couple of weeks ago, you and your husband, I came over to look at your LXV.” “Oh, yeah. How ya doin,” she said, not looking up from adjusting the zebra shower cap that donned her scooter’s seat, “can we get out of here, please,” she admonished her husband who looked equally unimpressed when I reintroduced myself as the woman he’d spent 40 minutes talking bikes with but a couple of weeks before. Within ten minutes or so, the scooter club members buzzed off in groups of two or three, hootin’ and hollerin’ in wild ingin code, leaving me there alone to find my way out of the tangled streets of the West Village.

By the time I found my way back to the bridge, I realized I would probably never take the time to make it back to their bar. The guys were cool, but the mean girl’s cold facades had eclipsed their efforts – hell bent on keeping their female membership down near the single digits.

I’ve since spent some time on their forum. I jumped in on a couple of topics, even posted a couple of question of my own, all of which went unanswered. Seemed all the comment threads were dominated by about 10 key members, peppered with back and forth ribbing and private in jokes. These senior club members were all crowned with the badge, “Scooter Royalty” by their names. At the top of the club’s forum page was an invitation in bold type, “Join us on Wednesday nights, we’ll make you feel welcome,” yet I’d felt anything but. Whether it’s lunch tables, Country Clubs, or Scooterati – the dynamic isn’t so much about who’s in the club, it more about who’s not.

THE HAIRCUT

2011-01-24T14:40:00.001-08:00

I had a crush on him for way too long. I felt like the lame 12 year old girl pining away at the boy in class who doesn’t know she’s alive. But the thing was, I was quite a bit older than 12, and the grown up boy did seem to know I was very much alive. Every time I went by the bike shop he would put his wrench down, walk outside and strike up a conversation with me, to the point where the shop's owner had to come out and break up the tete-a-tete. He was a working class guy but had plenty to say, his sense of humor was an eleven – me, often being fodder for his material. “She’ll be knee draggin’ by the end of the month, we’ll be seein’ her in all the bike mags by October - holdin' a trophy 4 times her size.” It was true, I was a little obsessed with riding, I had just started riding that Spring and had upgraded my scooter 3 times by that Fall. The guys in my little local scoot shop seemed amused by my enthusiasm and Aidan ribbed me on a regular basis. And I was pretty sure he had a crush, shuffling nervously as he inhaled his Marlboro, getting a few inches from my face as he checked to make sure my brake caliper was nice and tight. There was another mechanic who would sometimes work at the shop, a weight lifting, off the boat Italian that used to work on his Harley and would chat me up every time we both happened to show up at the same time. “Hey, keep away from her, Scumbag,” Aidan would say half jokingly, positioning himself between me and the handsome Italian, executing the perfect cock block much to my delight.

Months had gone by, it was getting ridiculous. Each time I called the shop and Aidan would pick up, he’d be like a chatty schoolgirl, when I’d run into him on the street he would stutter and blush. Only thing was, he hadn’t asked me out.

“Do you know if he’s actually single,” my friend Deb inquired in her boarding school Aussie accent, “It does seem strange, if you are, in fact, reading the situation correctly.” It was strange, inexplicable, and incredibly frustrating. But I couldn’t bare the thought of asking, “hey, do you have a girlfriend?” It felt pushy, like I was tipping my hand. I stopped asking boys out in high school, and found it was always better to let them take the lead. I had way too many girlfriends who would ask guys if they wanted to get married, to have kids, it always made me wince. And years later, these same girls never seemed to get past a second date. Yet, something had to give, this crush had gone on much too long.

A couple of days later I stopped by the shop to pick up my motorcycle after an oil change. As usual, Aidan didn’t rush to get my keys, but grabbed his smokes and stood with me for our traditional chat. He looked great. At first I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. His goatee was trimmed precisely, his hair looked like it was cut at some premier salon in the city, not a barber shop where I suspected an Irish boy from Queens would go. “Aidan, you look great,” I was wowed. He took a long puff from his butt, looking into the distance. “Really, you look really good. Your hair looks terrific,” I continued, trying to elicit a response. I felt smooth, I was letting him know I thought he was cute, and I had the new haircut to use as an excuse. He shuffled his feet, saying a muffled, “um, thanks.” He looked over towards the water, exhaling the light grey smoke, I checked out the back, it was really nice work. When he turned back to look at me I noticed the goatee was really on point. This wasn’t the handy work of a mechanic at home with an electric razor. “Aidan, seriously, you look amazing. Where’d you get your haircut,” he'd stomped on the cigarette mid point, I was following him back into the shop now, he had picked up a wrench without the -get back to work- goading from his boss. “My girlfriend. My girlfriend cut it, I usually go to a regular barber, but she cuts hair so ,” his voice trailed off as he started to tap at some metal piece he was locking onto the bike in front of him.

“Oh WOW!!!,” I said, my response came out as more of a shriek than the casual tone I had intended, “she’s really good!!” I was hoping my enthusiasm would shroud my disappointment. But moments later the disappointment was eclipsed by a feeling of relief – I would never have to struggle with -does he like me, will he ask me out, does he have a girlfriend- again. He had a girlfriend. He probably did like me, and now I had a reasonable explanation I could tell myself why he hadn’t asked me out. It was all wrapped up in a nice pretty package, albeit a package filled with engine grease, cigarettes, and a good measure of “what if.”

DRIVING

2011-01-22T18:56:00.000-08:00

driving and driving
all coming clear the further away she got
square jawed, carved-from-marble
holding her tight to hurt.

today it was her birthday
let’s go somewhere nice
taking her hand like Prince Charming
into that dark depressing place.
“Happy birthday, Babe,” he grinned
with startling perfect teeth.
Champagne toast to another year -
flat beer poured in a glass.

It never crossed his mind that day
she wouldn’t be coming back
never gave it a thought
to be kind or clear the dishes
or to show up when he said.

driving and driving
she drove til he was gone.
Who woulda thunk it.
Not him. Not her.
But it was her birthday
and she would never go back again.

WHY YOU ARE NOT SETH ROGAN

2011-01-18T11:42:00.000-08:00

I just spent some time on FB, a guy who is a little-known (I’m being generous here) actor was ruminating on Seth Rogan’s career. He said it could have just as easily been him in Mr. Rogan’s position.

First off, let me say that I doubt that Seth Rogan’s “position” is horizontal on a sofa that is in dire need of a spritz of Febreze. He’s probably on a press tour, or in a hotel room hammering out some ideas for his next screenplay.

The couched actor on FB was also scoffing at Mr. Rogan’s “big money” “Hollywood formula” choices.

Yes. Why accept a role as the first anti-hero super hero, be #1 at the box office, when you can maintain your artistic “standards” by eating Chinese take-out on the sofa watching Inside the Actor’s Studio re-runs, having imaginary “what-if” convos with James Lipton while stroking your cat.

Don’t mistake Seth Rogan’s career as a blunder, or a happy mistake. He is not spending his days taking his mental health temperature with a rectal thermometer, and then reporting every downturn on Facebook. He’s not taking pot-shots at other actors who have greater success than he. He’s not a man who seems to get caught up in negativity and probably prescribes to the credo – no matter where you are in your career – you have no business looking down at anyone else. Or looking way way up, then down, in the case of our FB actor.

Does Seth Rogan ever ask himself, how did I get here? It could have just as easily been Dan Jerkin. Probably. That’s because he’s humble, has a sense of humor and irony. But the opposite scenario of Dan Jerkin thinking he could have just as easily been Seth Rogan makes Dan vain, humorless, with a self-fulfilling prophecy to be “undervalued” (read: not cast). Seth Rogan got swept up by a magic carpet, rode it well, stayed on it, and keeps riding. Dan Jerkin’s carpet isn’t magic, it simply lies there, peppered with potato chip dust, hairballs, and spilt milk.

Watch and learn from Seth Rogan, as you would Pacino, or Marlon Brando. None of these men busied themselves talking down about other actors, they dedicated themselves to perfecting their craft. They didn’t announce to the world, I could easily be Paul Newman, or Sir Lawrence Olivia, or Seth Rogan. They wanted to be the best Pacino, or Brando they could be.

So, Dan, forget about Seth Rogan, it’s time to leave the pity party and be the best Jerkin you can be. You may be repulsed by the red carpet, scoff at the award show after parties, and wish to avoid the “Hollywood scene”, and in that respect, your career is firmly on track. Bravo!

No one said being an actor would be easy – it isn’t dumb luck, or eating sour grapes, or thinking you could have done a better John Adams than Paul Giamatti if given the chance, because the truth is, "chance" has very little to do with the business of success.

THE VALENTINE

2011-01-12T11:49:00.000-08:00

She was cheating on him but he was completely in the dark. Her strategy was genius, accuse him of cheating on a regular basis – one day she found a blond hair on his Men’s Warehouse jacket and made him account for it. It turned real CSI, she wouldn’t let it go. She taped the blond hair to the refrigerator and drew red arrows pointing to it with her lipstick from Duane Reade, he owed her an explanation. He racked his brain to account for the thin blond strand – he prayed that it would deteriorate under the cellophane tape, but it was there every time he went to take a sip out of the two liter bottle of Mountain Dew. Was it someone from the job, a woman at the bodega? She made him jump through hoops, sniffing at his collar every time he came through the door. Going through his phone, his emails, tracking every move he made. He didn’t know why she didn’t trust him. He had only slept with one other woman, and that was at the very beginning before they talked about being monogamous. They didn’t use that word, she said “I don’t want you fucking those whores anymore,” he took it as a sign of affection. She didn’t exactly have a way with words, but her proclamation made him feel special, loved, “no more whores” was her, “I love you”. They had gone from the No More Whores stage to moving in to his small house, he already had a ring on layaway at Sears he looked forward to the day he made the final payment, he would get down on one knee, then a nice wedding at The Grand Prospect Hall, her mother had a CD that would be maturing, she’d pulled him aside one Sunday after church to tell him she had 8 grand to kick in for the reception.

But that day seemed very far away. Rarely a day went by when he wouldn’t find the pants he left on the floor with the pockets turned inside out. But it was all part of a strategy, she was the one having the affair. She was an RN at the local hospital, a cop came in one night with a kid who’s finger had been shot off, it was her high school sweetheart, and it was back on like no time had passed. He had a wife, and four kids, and two black labs – he didn’t want to rock the boat, but he had a libido for Godsakes and his wife only fucked him on birthdays and New Years Eve – a man has his needs. With all the stress on the job, the cockroach crack heads, the gang bangers, his hard assed Lew gunning for him, even the fucking hipsters rubbed him the wrong way, talking down to him like he was an idiot or something. The affair was so easy, he didn’t look out of place strolling into the ER, they could slip into an empty room or a supply closet where they could fuck, or he could get a world class BJ, it was working for him. She treated him like a man, for fucksakes, she didn’t get all over him about getting to every fucking soccer game, or ask him where he was every second of the day or night. And she didn’t mind having sex, she actually loved it, needed it, why else would she be texting him every twenty minutes or so. He had to wipe that grin off his face.

She would get home for work and immediately jump into the shower to get the smell of her cop off of her. She had to cover her bases. She would start right in, he had peeled the yellowing tape of the refrigerator, and Windexed off the accusatory red lipstick arrows which she immediately escalated into a fight. He’d made another payment down at Sears that afternoon, but it was all for nothing, he couldn’t seem to win. He didn’t dare reach over and touch her at night, she’d shove him away so hard sometimes he'd found marks in the morning on his chest.

He tried everything in his power to please her, he would cook his special spaghetti with three kinds of meat, use the fabric softener when he did the laundry, nothing seemed to help. One day he was washing and waxing her Ford, he liked to keep it nice for her, he had started to clean the inside, too, carefully removing all the fast food wrappers from the back window that the wind had blown back there, then fishing around under the driver's seat with his head pressed against the ridged upholstery that smelled of cigarettes and tacos, it was her perfume. One day, he found an envelope down there, it was a Valentine, not the cheap kind you got at the drugstore, but a Hallmark card that cost $3.75. It was four days after Valentine’s day, had she forgotten it was there? He’d bought her a dozen roses from the side of the road, and picked up a white teddy bear holding a red satin heart, she had said she hadn’t had time to reciprocate, it had been a full moon that week and the ER had been bursting at the seams. He wondered if she had forgotten, the card was very romantic, and she had signed it in magic marker, and made a smooch mark with her lipstick, the same red stain she had used to draw the blaming arrows on the fridge.

He gathered all his courage, she angered so easily, as he walked into the kitchen, she slapped shut her flip phone and said, “what’s up” like she didn't even care. He walked towards her with the peach colored envelope – the cat had her tongue. Maybe he ruined the surprise, she snatched the envelope from him, and disappeared from the room, he followed her into the bedroom, she had locked herself in there and was speaking in hushed tones, no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t crack the code. He wasn’t fucking whores, or any of the nice girls that would smile at him at Friday’s where he would go on all those nights she had to work OT. He had a few more months to pay off the solitaire, maybe he would throw in the necklace to match. She was a stunner, the only woman for him, he couldn’t bare the thought of losing her, he would do whatever it took. She came out of the bathroom saying, “spray the f'n bathroom after you take an f'n crap.” It was her way of saying, “I love you,” he thought as he gathered the towels from the hamper to put in the next load of wash.

MARCEL'S FRIEND

2011-01-11T12:36:00.000-08:00

Marcel Marceau, the world’s most famous mime was coming to perform at my high school, and I had snagged a free ticket through the drama department. There were a handful of free tickets available to those of us in the Drama Club, Mr. Pia, our director, called them “Meems,” I winced every time he said it. “Meems,” “Mimes,” whatever, I would be going that Saturday night, for free.

I put on a dress and some eye-shadow and made it to the high school theater, excitement filled the air. The stage was usually reserved for high school productions, but occasionally world famous talent would appear. The house was packed, I took my orchestra seat next to a pretty girl with long blond hair accented with a black velvet headband. I couldn’t tell if she was a girl or a woman, she was somewhere in between. She spoke very eloquently about Marcel Marceau’s talents, she was a long time fan – so much so that she had become almost a friend, she explained – she had been to so many of his shows that she had lost count. I listened and nodded, I wondered where she’d learned to speak so prettily; maybe at some private school in Switzerland or someplace like that. She sat with her hands folded in her lap, securing her program ever so lightly, as not to mar or bend the pristine cover that was graced by the great Marcel. I told her that I had only seen mimes on 5th Avenue in the city, that they scared me – how they would follow you, making fun or you without your knowledge. She scoffed, shaking her head with an adamant, “no.” There was only one Marcel Marceau, she assured me, I was in for a night I would never forget. She seemed to be warming up to me – her haughty tone relaxed a bit as she offered to take me backstage to meet The Master, himself. Luck was with me, first the comp. ticket, and now being seated next to a personal friend of the greatest meem of all time. As the theater lights dimmed, she reached over and squeezed my hand in anticipation, and ssh’d the audience who had not yet piped down.

The show was spellbinding. Marcel was much better than those hacks in New York City, you could hear a pin drop between the audiences “oo’s and ah’s,” chuckles and eventual guffaws.

As the lights came up, my new friend beat everyone to the punch of the standing ovation, carefully balancing her program on the seat’s edge as it sprung back to its folded position. She was the last one to stop clapping, and gestured that we take our seats again as the audience lolygagged out of the theater to find their cars.

“What a treat,” she said breathlessly! “I have seen him a hundred times, and could see him a hundred times more.” She sounded like a fairytale princess, her eyes were fixed on the closed curtain as though he was still standing there. “Let’s give him a moment, and then I’ll take you backstage,” she finally turned to me, eyes full of anticipation. “Where’s your program,” she said in an urgent, panicked voice – her eyes nervously scanning my lap. I opened my purse and showed her I had tucked it away to safety. “Oh, thank GOODNESS,” she exhaled, “you’ll want to save that forever.”

Soon, we were the only ones left in the theater, it seemed the time was right. She looked around from left to right, and a quick check behind, then turned to me and whispered, “NOW!!”

She gracefully led me to the stage door, and opened it quietly, waving me inside. One of the tech people was busy sweeping the concrete floor.

“Excuse me,” she said as though addressing a servant, “we’re here to see Monsieur Marceau, I’m a personal friend.” The backstage sweeper was casually attentive and told us to wait as she put the broom down to deliver the message to The Great Marceau. My new friend smoothed her perfect blond hair with one hand, while the other hand held her program in its pristine state.

Mr. Marceau appeared out of the darkness, his whiteface eerily glowing as he walked gracefully towards us until something froze him in his tracks.

“Monsieur Marceau,” my friend exclaimed, “what a triumph, as always!” The King of Mimes looked nervously around him, he spoke with a slight voice, as he quickly started to back away.

“Oui, oui,” he said stepping back, being careful not to have his back towards us, “oui, Merci,” he grabbed the arm of another Frenchman who had appeared out of the darkness where Marcel had emerged. The chalked-faced mime scurried off behind the folds of curtain, his manager said a brusque, “Bonsoir, Madame,” to my velvet headbanded friend. “Eef you wait here une minute, Monsieur Marceau will sign your programs!”
My friend nodded gracefully, looking over at me to see if I was impressed.

“How about that,” she said, “you have met The Great Marcel Marceau, now he’s off to fetch a pen!” The manager had rushed off in the same direction as Marceau, we stood there in the wings, I would have wandered out the stage door and out to my car if it weren’t for the fact that we were told to wait right there.

After a few minutes two Police Officers came through the stage door. They flanked Marcel’s fan, each taking an arm as though escorting her to a procession or formal ball. Marcel’s moonglow face peered out between the curtains at the activity, seeing if the coast was clear. The officers walked her out, she didn’t seem alarmed, “Gentleman, I will ask you to wait, Monsieur Marceau will wonder where I’ve disappeared to,” she was insistent as they gingerly walked her out the door. “What a momentous evening,” she heralded in my direction as the metal door slammed shut behind her and the men in blue.

Marcel’s manager appeared again, demanding to know how I knew the refined young woman. I told him that I had just happened to be seated next to her, and that she was kind enough to extend an invitation backstage. “She is an unfortunate young woman, we have had many encounters before. We have been assured that she is not dangerous, but she has escaped the facility many times to see Monsieur Marceau,” He gave a polite snap of his head bidding me adieu.

Apparently, the refined escape artist had traveled far and sometimes across state lines to catch Marceau’s show. This time being the shortest voyage, she had left the great mansion, the local mental institution where only the wealthiest mental cases were welcome. She had dressed herself prettily, snuck out a window, glided across the great front lawn of the impressive estate where they shocked people’s brains back to some state of sanity. From there she had a quarter mile stroll to the high school where Marcel would be delighting the Connecticut locals, with more than enough time before curtain to secure herself a program, take an empty seat, and to compose herself before The Great Master Mime would take the stage and give us a night we would never forget.

THE INTERNET – WHAT'S AN ILLITERATE TO DO?

2011-01-09T09:10:00.000-08:00

I ran across a profile on a dating site of a man that I encountered at a restaurant bar a few years ago. A working class bloke who was versed in Brooklynese, I suspected that he had stopped paying attention in class around the 3rd grade, his vocabulary was limited to two syllable words and under, his grammar appalling, his thick bridge and tunnel brogue didn’t help matters much.

I clicked on his photo, I was curious to see how he would present himself in a medium where prose is king.

Clearly, he had enrolled in a writing program at Columbia or some such school. His sentences were well-constructed, his charm was jumping off the page. “They’re”, “there”, and “theirs” were as they should be. He didn’t stop at periods and comma’s, there were semicolons and m dashes, too!

Clearly a case of Cyrano – it was a charming profile, but the plan was clearly flawed. A bait n switch scenario, how would he get past the first email exchange? A pipe and smoking jacket by night, a Sanitation worker by day, I’m sure these guys existed, but with this guy it surely was not the case. His gift for sparkling conversation was limited; the only four-syllable word I heard him use at the bar, “Jagermeister”.

Perhaps he would supply a phone number and nothing else in a first email for some unsuspecting copy editor, lawyer, or Wall Street gal to use. The first few seconds of the conversation would be cut short. Why set yourself up for such embarrassment?

The same applies to men or women who post a photo from a decade or two ago, or of their body before the ravages of time or too much pizza had taken their toll. It may get you to an email exchange, even a phone call or two – but the face to face meeting can only be put off for so long, eventually you have to show up ¬– it’s hard to hide the extra pounds, the missing teeth, the lapsed education. I knew a man who had exchanged emails with a beautiful woman from New Jersey. When she rolled up in her steel wheelchair and excess weight. He still took her to dinner, then sent her a brief polite goodbye the moment he arrived home. Misrepresentation front loads hope, but the end result is the self- fulfilling prophecy that inspired the fraud in the first place.

How do we best sell ourselves online, in a medium where visuals rule, and words play a close second? People of all shapes and sizes, and all levels of verbal dexterity deserve love, and in the real world, they find it. Are some people just better off staying away from dating sites, and Facebook where witty repartee and decent spelling are the price of entry? It doesn’t seem quite fair, but does this medium exclude the underachievers, the less than picture perfect, or those who simply can’t type? Misrepresentation is one of the inherent tools available to us on the internet, but it only gets you so far – when the buyer receives the fake Rolex – whether it be watch or perspective date – it’s game over.

GOOD AND BORED

2011-01-06T08:56:00.000-08:00

It’s a new year, and heck if I can figure out what to write about. I was struggling with an addiction in 2010, a full-on monkey on my back that goes by the name of “Drama”. My main supplier, this blog: claudtalks. It was stirring up all sorts of trouble. Pissed off boyfriends, ex-boyfriends, bikers, cops, many leaving threatening comments on the claudtalks threads, or sending text messages alerting me that trouble was on the rise. A lawyer friend advised me to keep a log of comments and characters, I was watching my back, the president of a biker crew was taking meetings with another crew to tell them the back off or there would be trouble. Up to this point I had used my writing skills to sell shampoo and dog food to consumers, I had definitely upped the ante. Blogging became an addiction, and a dangerous one at that. The drama that spun out of it resulted in increased heart rate, fear, excitement, power, and validation, a powerful elixir that would lead to no good. I had people reading claudtalks from NYPD computers, pissed off girlfriends of ex’s checking claudtalks 2 or more times a day – I made a vow not to write stories about anyone who carries weapons legally or illegally, anyone dressed as a pirate, cop, or any other costume designed to instill “respect” in others. There had to be some gripping story matter involving those who wear cotton, silk, flannel, or denim, those never diagnosed with mental health issues, plagued with prison records, or restraining orders.

There was a harmless story about a guy I had worked with – the fellow had removed the period at the end of the sentence on a print ad I was doing at work. I was amused at how much of a to-do a little period had caused, I wrote about it on my blog. A couple of weeks later an innocent bystander on the project read the post and left a comment, a lone frown-ie face. She was just starting out in the business, and although she had just been following orders when she removed the offending period, she took my blogpost to heart. She didn’t threaten me with bodily harm, a speeding ticket, or legal action – her shamed expression when we ran into each other on the street still stung hard. I still hadn’t gotten it right.

Later, I wrote a story about a friend of mine who had found happiness in an extramarital affair, it had helped smooth things out at home between her and her husband – which I found to be curious and amazing. She had been coaxing me to write her story, after refining it – switching out names, locations, time frames – it hadn’t been up more than 8 minutes when alarming emails, incoming. Her boyfriend “happened” to come across my blog, he was livid. The fact that I had spun their affair into a quick fix of her marriage sent him into a tailspin of fury, she was annoyed that I had mistaken the new calm in her home as any sign of a romantic rekindling. Claudtalks helped precipitate the end of the year-long affair. The damage was done – I deleted the piece from the blog, I had done this too many times before – I had already removed over a year of blogposts in the interest of freeing my blog of any drama inducing content, and here I was again. Drama school was back in session.

What to write about? Stories about me and ex-boyfriends – out. Stories about me and co-workers – nix. Ditties about me and friends – N.O. Claudtalks power to offend had rendered it frozen, I was sitting paralyzed in front of my keypad wondering where to take it all next.

Claudtalks taught me a lot, seeing my life play out in black and white. I realized that I have a penchant for screwed up guys, that I was addicted to drama, and could actually feel it deliciously coursing through my viegns. It taught me that what’s good for claudtalks, isn’t good for Claud – I had to part ways with drama – it won’t be easy, we’ve been dating for years. I heard a shrink on TV tell an addict, “you need to embrace boredom” – it struck a chord, so Boredom, come to Mama. Don’t wink at the bad man on the motorcycle, don’t start wars over punctuation, don’t catch up with the driver that cut you off at the light. That stuff’s not you. And while I figure out who exactly “you” is, the blog will have to be patient. It’s been over a month, and I still don’t know what to write.

When drama peaked on claudtalks, my readership was through the roof. People getting pissed off seemed to go hand-in-hand with increased hits. I wasn’t the only drama addict, I had a readership that thrived on it as well, I left them all back in 2010. The question remains, what’s in store for 2011? And will anyone give a hoot?

I woke up this morning, made some coffee and checked if anyone had visited claudtalks besides an occasional friend, or a random blog surfer from Czechoslovakia. And there it was, a hit from an NYPD computer – just like back in the old days – my blood started rushing, I felt “alive” again – sitting sipping coffee from a hand made mug, all toasty in my flannel PJ’s,– that delicious drama gave a little “you hooo!!” to me before I reminded myself that I have a date with boredom today – and I’m actually looking forward to it; and if I’m doing everything right – it won’t be anything to write home about.

THE CAR STEREO STORY

2010-11-29T10:06:00.000-08:00

I had been fighting with my boyfriend for the past couple of days. “Eat your own damned food off your own damned plate,” he snapped, I quickly withdrew my fork from his enchilada, he was an angry little fuck, I thought, I knew this when I met him. He had a lot of childhood trauma, had been mugged 3 times in the past decade, and had to go through life as a 5’4” man, but still you can’t let me taste your enchilada? After hitting his favorite Mexican restaurant, it was off to the comic book store, and then to the sneaker store, he explained that this trauma had robbed him of his childhood, I was along for the ride as he reclaimed his pre-teen years, we would be forty before we knew it.

Tomorrow was going to be dedicated to me, I had decided, Dave had come home with bags of comics, toys, and sneakers, he’d spent his paycheck like a kid blowing his allowance on stupid stuff. But in the morning, I would be getting a custom sound system installed in my new sports car. I had done all the research myself, had purchased all the best components I could afford, and now I was off to the sound system installers in Park Slope I’d heard were some of the best.

I was waiting in front of the place for about 45 minutes, the steel gate was down when I had arrived in time for my appointment. I was thinking I should leave already when the guy screeched into the slot next to me in front of the gate. My installer had arrived, he was hard-to-look-at hot. He introduced himself, pulled up the heavy metal gate with one hand as he explained that he was the preeminent sound system installer in all of Brooklyn, and told me to come back to pick up my wheels at five. When I returned that evening, he was sitting in my car admiring his work, it did sound fine, and he looked good there in the driver’s seat. We spent an oddly long time there in the driveway there in my car, but my boyfriend would be waiting outside my place any minute, so I wrote a check and asked Johnny for my car back.

I loved this car, and now that I had this primo system installed, there would be no stopping me. I roared back down Union Street, windows down, speakers loud, I wanted to see what it could do. I hit the dial that balanced the power between the front speakers and the back, and turned it all the way to the back speaker position, but the front speakers went full tilt. When I turned the dial to the front speaker position, the back speakers shook the house. The preeminent sound system installer had screwed up my installation, for a moment I was regretting not going with the stock sound system, but I reassured myself that everything would be made right. I parked the car and Dave was sitting on my stoop with his hoodie pulled up around his head, he thought he was a baller now. Sometimes out of nowhere he would start talking like a homie. He’d say “woot yoo saee” instead of “what did you say”? He’d been waiting for ten minutes, “where you been, woomone,” he said, snapping his head back, as I put the key in the front door to my lobby. It was a little hard not to laugh, he was a 5’4” white boy from Indiana, but alright. “I wanna get some chicken for dinner, you good with dat?” There wasn’t a Popeye’s in Carroll Gardens, a pro or con of the neighborhood depending on your tastes, but I ordered him some chicken wings and fried rice, and myself a steamed chicken a broccoli. He was glued to yet another basketball game on TV, yelling at the TV in ebonics, eating his chicken dinner. I went into the bathroom and gave myself a facial then went to bed while Dave was in the other room watching his double dip of Seinfeld reruns. I wondered if he would now morph from a black man into some other personae, his hood was now in the down position, he had changed into his sleep pants, eating Ben and Jerry’s with a big soup spoon. I was pretty certain he was now a seven-year old boy state. Either way, it was all good, I would go back to the sound system installer first thing when they opened and ask Johnny to make my back to front speaker snafu right.

Johnny was out in front when I got there, catching some rays like he was poolside at some Beverly Hill’s hotel. “Hey, babe – nice to see ya,” he said, his handsome face tilted upwards to soak up the skin-damaging rays.

“Look,” I told him, “you crossed some wires or something, the back is front and the front is back,” so went my diagnostic assessment. “Oh no. Did I?.” he was feeling all of his pockets for a pack of cigarettes. “Not a big deal, leave it, I’ll try and get to it by the end of the day,” he said reaching through the driver’s window to take the keys. I wasn’t sure what other business he had going, given he was sunbathing and smoking and there were no cars in the garage save for mine. But I hopped a cab to work, and got back to the garage at five on the dot.

“You’re good to go,” he grinned as he pulled the car out, “listen.” He turned the dial all the way to the back position, the back speakers went all out. He turned the dial to the front speakers, it was true, I was good to go.

As I pulled out the driveway, he pounded on the hood and stood with his fists at his waist like a super hero who had saved the day. What a stud, I thought, as I threw it into second gear down Union Street. Boy, this sound system sounded great, I was glad I hadn’t gone with that stock stuff they sell you with the car – too much money, and not enough power. Ha, I’d got it right. I moved the balance slider over to the left, both front and back left speakers went silent, I moved it to the right, the right went dead. Unbelievable. I hung a U-turn and gunned it back to the garage but the metal gate was already down and handsome was out of sight.

I drove home and parked the car, and Dave came over. I tried to tell him about my trials with my car stereo, but he was too busy pouring over comic books he was pulling out of his Jansport backpack. He didn’t like to be interrupted when he was sorting through new additions to his collection. I reached over and picked one up to show interest. “Hon. I ask you one more time not to touch my things,” he admonished me, “please respect that.” I couldn’t tell what personae he was in. Was he a ten-year old reading comic books? Was he a trauma survivor with serious control issues? Was he a middle-aged West Village Lesbian therapist? All I knew was my head hurt, I would go back to the sound installer in the morning, I went off to bed early so I could get up to be there right when they open.

It was 10 A.M. and the gate was down. 11 came and went, I called into work to say I would be more than my usual late. Johnny finally rolled in around around 11:45. “Hey, babe – how ya doin,” he said as he hopped out of his black car and threw up the gate. “No big deal,” he said, “we were so busy yesterday, I musta got distracted.” There were still no cars in the garage. “Let me make it up to you, whadya say we go out tonight and catch a bite.” The most inept sound system installer in all of Brooklyn, and possibly all of the tri-state area had asked me out on a date.

“I don’t think so,” I said, “just please get it right this time, OK?”

“Anything for you, Babe,” he said, snatching the keys from my hand and pulling me towards him. The guy was incompetent, but cute. Still, I had Dave, my loyal, loving when he wasn’t angry, twelve year old, trauma surviving, black militant, lesbian lawyer boyfriend.

When I finally got into the office there was a message from Dave. “Hon. How many times have I told you not to touch my stuff. I’m pretty sure you moved my action figures. I don’t remember moving them myself, and I have a pen mark where each of them should be. And they’re not on the pen mark. It’s Dave, call me back.”

Ugg. I had given Dave a corner of my apartment to keep some of his things. He had put up shelves to display his many action figures, comic books, and Martin Luther King Jr. memorabilia. While I was doing some light cleaning I had, in fact, touched his action figures. I should have taken a Polaroid of them to put them back just so, but I had screwed up big time, I had removed them from their Bic pen marks on the wood, and all hell had broken loose. Dave would sometimes adopt a white-trash beer drinking personae, and he’d say it like, “All hill is broke loose,” no matter how you said it, there would be hell to pay.

I went back to the sound system garage, Johnny was in the driver’s seat cranking the thing to eleven, smoking a cigarette. “Hey, babe, check it,” he said proudly, “back… front…. Left… right…. loud…. soft… Perrrfect.” It was true. And although he completely screwed up my stereo the first couple of times, he was pretty perfect himself. Over six foot, jet black hair, muscles, face, psychologically simple. “You still wanna hang out tonight,” I said, jumping into the passenger seat. I had never called Dave back about the action figure debacle, I was in hot water already, I figured just go for the gold and go out with the guy that looks like he’s in the road tour of GREASE.

“Let’s just stop back at my place so I can change, K?,” he said, throwing my car into reverse, “I'm all hot 'n' sweaty, we were biz-eee,” he drove us out to some God forsaken no-wheres-land section of Brooklyn.

He unlocked the deadbolt to his basement apartment, and asked me to sit down on his leather couch while he took a shower. There was a giant birdcage with no bird, a huge TV, an orange shag carpet, the leather sofa and mirrored coffee table in front of it. The place was immaculate, Johnny was in the shower, my car was parked outside, I wanted to call Dave, but there was no phone. The place smelled of room deodorizer, or those car freshener trees you hung from rear view mirrors, it was turning my stomach, I suddenly wanted to go home but I didn’t see my car keys, Johnny had never handed them back. I waited for him to come out, he was now in his bedroom changing, I would tell him I had a change of heart.

Suddenly, the room went pitch black, some multi-colored lights came on from above my head that were flashing in time to the disco track that was suddenly pounding around my head from some mysterious source, I hadn’t seen any equipment. Johnny emerged from his bedroom dressed in skin tight briefs, dancing like it was a show. Hands clasped, moving his arms in a wave pattern, flexing his muscles, giving me the back view, then front view, then back again.

“DID I TELL YOU,” he yelled over the music, “BEFORE I WAS A SOUND SYSTEM INSTALLER, I WAS A DANCER AT CHIPPENDALES!” He was mid-routine, I was sure he had seen his fair share of five spots shoved in the top of his Speedos. His chest was waxed, his shoulders were huge, his penis was in the down position, but seemed to be hard, he was reliving his glory days there in the basement apartment in Bumfulk, Brooklyn. “OH YEAH, OH YEAH,” he whisper/screamed over the music, his choreography hardwired into his muscle memory. He was building towards something, some big crescendo, some grand finale, whatever it was, it would be happening inches from my face. He had me pressed against the back of the leather sofa, which upon closer inspection may have been Naugahyde – he had jumped up on the couch so I could get up close and personal with what appeared to be red nylon briefs, but it was hard to tell in the dark room with the multicolored flashing light show.

“I want to go home,” I choked under his gyrating girth, the evening had taken an unfortunate turn.

“YOU WANT WHAT, BABE? YOU WANT THIS?,” he yelled to top the music, which suddenly stopped, he was breathing heavily from the vigorous dance routine, straddling my lap, his huge thighs locking me in. “You want this,” he whispered in the silence before the next disco hit kicked in. I was hungry and scared and wanted to go home and call Dave.

I pushed Johnny off of me, he grabbed both of my hands to pull me up off the sofa, he thought I wanted to dance. “I WANT TO GO HOME,” I repeated, “WHERE’S MY KEYS??,” I yelled after him, he was doing some backwards come hither pony step move, then went into a spin. I felt around for a light switch, but gave up and grabbed my bag of the sofa, and started feeling around the coffee table for my keys. “WHERE YA GOIN BABE? THIS SHOW’S ALL FOR YOU,” The scent of his deodorant was taking over the room, creating a toxic hybrid perfume with the pine air freshener fragrance, I was feeling around the carpet for my keys. “YOU LEAVIN? YOU SURE?,” with that, he theatrically pulled the red nylon fabric away from his stomach and down with his thumbs, revealing a huge penis, two tiny bird’s egg testicles were hanging on for dear life under the wood.

“JOHNNY, WHERE ARE MY KEYS??,” I yelled trying to push past him, he grabbed my wrists.

“WHERE YA GOIN, I THOUGHT WE’D ORDER PIZZA. YOU LIKE PIZZA?,” he was in a slow improvised sway now. I broke free of his hold and felt around and found the light switch. He was standing there naked in the garish white light, music blasting, the red Speedo now taught around his calves. He waddled that way back into the bedroom and turned off the music, returned with the briefs pulled back up, holding my keys. “Do I at least get a kiss,” he said like a spurned boy on a first date, as he handed the keys back to me.

“Jeesh, where’s my purse,” I said, disoriented, my Coach bag was on the floor, I must have dropped it during our forced dance/scuffle. I unlocked the dead bolt, leaving him standing there in the middle of the room naked – he seemed perplexed how his first date strategy had gone so wrong.

I got into my car and just started driving until I found a familiar road that could take me home, I turned the stereo system off when I started the car, and left it off the entire ride home.

When I finally got home, there were two messages. Dave had called, “Hon, I’m sorry I got mad about the action figures. We’ve talked about this before, but I forgive you, and I love you, Hon. Call me back.” There was still 10 minutes before the double header of Seinfeld, he’d still be up, I wanted to hear his voice. Black Dave, white trash Dave, lesbian Dave, any Dave would do.

The other message was from Johnny. “Hey, got your number from your receipt – I wanted to say I had a real good time and if you’re free on Saturday,” I hit the erase button before he could finish, he sounded hopeful and sad and still a little out of breath. He called me the next three nights. That following Saturday night I told Dave I loved him back and asked him to move in the following week. He said yes as he pushed his plate of fried chicken and collard greens towards me, asking me if I might like to take a bite, “Yo, you want try some of dem collard greens,” black Dave inquired. But it sure beat Chippendale’s Johnny any day of the week.

DRIVING HOME JONAS

2010-11-14T13:29:00.001-08:00

I was about to give Jonas a ride home, he’d left his bike back at his place because it had snowed the night before. He had The Office DVD boxed set I had loaned him in one hand, and a substantial black leather and chrome harness in the other. “Want a bag for that,” I asked what I hoped sounded casually, pointing at the more forbidding of the two items. “No. No I don’t,” I had anticipated his matter of fact, non-negotiable response.

I think maybe we can make it into the hall, into the elevator, out of the building without being detected, pressing the lit down button frantically like a mad predator was gaining on me, but it was just my weightlifter hulk of a boyfriend humming mindlessly next to me. The elevator door opened, we had company for the long ride down: the roly-poly gay man from the 5th floor, and my neighbor Paul, who had married Lauren, an almost friend of mine who had a penchant for babbling other people’s business. Jonas entered first, with the ‘clank, clank’ of The Ghost of Christmas Past. I entered after him, pretending that his BDSM ecoutrement was no more noticeable than if he’d been carrying the Arts And Leisure section from The Sunday Times. “Hey, Claud,” Paul said half impressed, half aroused. The meek gay man stood silent, eyes popping and fixed on The Terminator to my right. Introductions were in order, “Paul, this is Jonas,” I said with a lilt, like I was introducing the boy I'd met him at the country fair. They exchanged hellos, Jonas looking straight ahead, not extending a hand. I didn’t know if bikers did’t subscribe to the school of basic common courtesies, or if shaking Paul’s hand would have required him to place the confining leather and stainless accessory into his other hand, which was already occupied with the lighthearted English comedy DVD. Paul mumbled something about he and Lauren heading off to MOMA, never once taking his eyes off my mighty date. Jonas outweighed him almost 3 to 1, and seemed to have Paul considering a first time homosexual encounter. My roly-poly gay neighbor had stopped breathing, and appeared hurt by the fact that I hadn’t extended an introduction his way (I had never learned his name), but was nonetheless getting a good eyeful of Jonas who was winding up his intimidation stare for the 2 block walk to my car in my quaint Brooklyn neighborhood.

The elevator door opened, Jonas thudded out first as usual, giving no thought to me, Paul or Lauren, or the tiny, stout gay man who was clumsily fighting off the closing elevator doors in an effort to keep up. The whole motley bunch made its way up the long ramp to the building’s front door, following Jonas’ lead; his mammoth leather jacket implying the slaughter of at least 4 animals, their fates delivered by Jonas’ own bare hands. Once outside, Jonas shifted his harness to his boxed set hand, taking my small hand into his death grip paw with tenderness. “We should go to MOMA sometime,” he said, wistfully – a small girl on a tricycle had to swerve out of his Frankenstein path, her mother averting her eyes, guiding her child out of harm’s way. I suspected there would be no MOMA in our future, they didn't serve shots of Jack, but Jonas was good times all the same. We grabbed some croissants, a pack of Camels; breakfast of champions for the ride home. Jonas rode shot-gun, quietly staring out at the gray February morning chomping on his chocolate croissant with childlike abandon, the XXL sex shop harness a-tangle at his feet.

THE CLOSET

2010-11-07T10:46:00.000-08:00

It never occurred to me that my boyfriend I’d been with for the last year and a half was homosexual. “The Streisand posters in his bedroom didn’t tip you off,” said my Dad after we broke up, one day later Jeff was engaging in butt play with another boy from the Theater department, the rumor mill had informed me. Apparently my parents knew my boyfriend was gay from the first day I brought him home, all my friends had a suspected it, but Jeff was about the best boyfriend I’d ever had, even to this day. He was very attentive, knew how to take a girl to dinner, insist she have dessert, and pick up the tab. When we were separated by school vacations, he would send me gift packages full of perfume, body and bath oil, and a cute warm scarf or jewelry, all nestled into tissue paper and sealed with a sweet note, the small envelope addressed with my pet name. Jeff was handsome, had a rockin’ body, and was charming as heck, the fact that he was gay fluttered over my head. I had somehow snagged an extra single room in my dorm at B.U., our “love shack”, that we would visit usually 3 times a day where me and my gay boyfriend would fuck like rabbits then stay up all night talking, we were madly in love.

I met him the very first day in the elevator at our dorm, he asked if he could carry a box I was bringing upstairs from my parent’s van. Two days later I broke up with my high school boyfriend I’d left back in Westport over the phone, Jeff was coming on strong and I was a goner. He had pictures in his room of Hanna, a gorgeous blond he had left back in high school, who he claimed was his girlfriend, she was so pretty, it never occurred to me that my real competition were dudes.

Jeff and I broke up after about 16 months, two days later he was having sex with Ron, a guy I had grown up with in the theater department back home, we had found our way to the same college where we both had voice lessons and yoga with Jeff. Soon, Jeff moved on into a cozy relationship with Seth, a good friend of mine, another theater student who had decided to pursue a career as a chef.

3 years later, Jeff and Seth became good couples friends with me and my boyfriend Phil, we spent holidays together, Seth would make the turkey, Phil would steal the wine from the fine restaurant he was working at, the four of us were very happy together, there was one rift between Jeff and Seth, Jeff had never come out to his parents.

Jeff’s parents had adored me, I was the only girl he had ever actually dated. They were the typical nice dysfunctional family from The Main Line outside Philly. Jeff’s mom went by the name, “June Bug,” she had everything ladybug, from pins, to mugs, to needlepoint pillows, Jeff’s dad looked like Ward Cleaver, but with Jeff’s ski jump nose – they were card carrying members of The Gin and Tonic Club. June Bug and Ward would take us to the overpriced 360 rotating bar in Boston where we’d order round after round of G n T’s, the potted plant at my right getting its buzz on due to me emptying drink after drink directly on its roots just to keep up with the party. I was soon invited to stay at their house on The Main Line, June Bug would make us lovely lunches of tuna salad sandwiches, chips, and iced tea, Jeff and I would escape to his tiny room, put on the Peter Frampton, and fuck like mad. The rest of the afternoon would be spent in the pool, or strolling around the neighborhood discussing what we were going to name our kids, or sneaking up to his sister’s room where the kid’s communal bong was kept. Around 3:30 the G n T’s would start flowing, although June Bug and Ward usually wreaked of booze shortly after breakfast was served. The grill would be fired up around 5, and Jeff’s closeted brother would show up with his wife and two kids. Jeff’s brother, Jack was quite flamboyant, owned a thriving florist’s business, Jeff and I would laugh at how he’d fooled everyone – June Bug, Ward, his wife. Jack, or "That Raging Queen,” as Jeff frequently referred to his older brother – had pulled the whole thing off.

That night, after everyone had passed out on too much gin and red meat, Jeff and I took advantage of the placid kidney shaped pool and the full moon and went skinny dipping. He had always been very attentive towards me sexually, but had always steered clear of my breasts. I had him up against the wall of the pool on the shallow end, by breasts floating above the water, I took Jeff’s arms from around my neck, and tried to coax his hands there. He said, “I think I’m going to throw up,” and ran from the pool and into the bushes. The vomiting when faced with my boobs, the Streisand posters, the love for musical comedy, it all started to add up.

I lost touch with Jeff for years, he and Seth had parted ways, Phil and I had done the same, I had heard Jeff had taken up with an older man, another theater enthusiast who was wealthy, they both resided in the rich man’s upper west side apartment, and hopped between that and this fellow’s place in Hawaii, and a little beach house they renovated together on the tip of Montauk. It was rumored that Jeff’s lover was HIV positive, and when Jeff finally got back in touch with me, his lover had passed, and Jeff told me he was HIV positive, and recently diagnosed with AIDS.

I took the long drive out to Montauk, Jeff looked much older, he was on a multiple of “cocktails” for AIDS. He had the companionship of two dacshunds, neither of which were potty trained, Jeff didn’t have to energy to train them, they willy-nilly pee’d throughout the house and in the beds but changing the sheets and following them around with paper towels required less energy than daily walks, he said as I handed my soaked bed sheet to him in the morning. Around noon, Jeff made me lunch, the same tuna salad sandwich and chips June Bug used to make us back at his childhood house on The Main Line. Halfway through my sandwich Jeff took my hand and proposed.

“Please, Claud. It would mean the world to my parents if we got married,” he had never told his parents who he is.

“Jeff, I really want you to be proud of who you are, I’m sure they know,” he put his cloth napkin to his mouth, then used it to wipe the potato chip dust from the table, shaking his head slowly, “no.”

“I don’t have a lot of time here,” he said looking down at his lap, the proposal continued,” if you do this one thing for me, I’ll leave you this place in my will. We can have the lawyers draw up something."

How I hated his parents for hating homosexuals. I hated them for shoving two sons into the closet. I hated them for denying their son his lifestyle, and the fact that they were calling his illness “cancer”. 4 months later, Jeff was gone. I received word that there would be a ceremony honoring his life back there on The Main Line, all of his parents friends would be there, his whole family, and some of Jeff’s friends would be invited as well.

All the friends that made it to Jeff’s lunch were mostly female, one or two if his gay friends were there, but no one too flamboyant – accept Jeff’s brother who of course did the flowers, they were stunning, the G n T’s were flowing, there were scrapbooks at tables that one of his sisters had put together filled with pictures of Jeff and his friends from back in high school, long before Jeff figured out who he really was.

June Bug rushed up to me right as the tea sandwiches were being passed, she pulled me by the arm over to a white cloth covered table where her friends were sitting in lovely Spring cardigans and strands of pearls. “Everyone! THIS is Claudia, Jeff’s girlfriend!” She introduced her friends to me one by one, I smiled, nodded, extended my manicured hand to each saying, “lovely, so nice to meet you,” June Bug’s face was swollen, but beaming.

June Bug, Ward, and Jeff’s next of kin had buried Jeff that morning in a quaint cemetery right outside The Main Line. Buried him in a closet, surrounded by lovely flowers supplied from his brother’s shop, everyone stoic and picture perfect – just the way Jeff would have wanted it.

THE BAD COP, THE CRACKHEAD, AND MY HEAD

2010-11-05T14:20:00.000-07:00

“If you see him coming towards you at a biker rally, run the other way,” the warning felt familiar, this wasn’t the first biker I had pissed off in the course of penning “claudtalks” but I thought I was done with that chapter in my life.

I had taken a riding course and had written what I thought was a harmless little piece about the weekend called, “Jiggy”. A story about a classmate who I first thought was under the influence of crack cocaine, turned out his skeletal physique and shaky hands were the result of leukemia and its treatment. I had warm feelings towards this guy, he inspired me with his survival against all odds, and his drive to learn to ride and take himself on a ride to explore the rest of his years on the road. One of the side characters was one of my instructors – a surly, Captain Ahab looking character, who was referred to in the piece as “the bad cop”. Hardly an assault on his reputation or effectiveness, the piece was not about him, although his demeanor was worthy of a much more illustrative piece reserved especially for him, I put the experience behind me, took the lessons learned on the road, and wrote a heartwarming piece about one of the classmates who stuck with me long after the weekend was through.

I come to find out that my blogpost is forwarded to the head of the riding school, and that it was interpreted as a signed affidavit of this instructor’s poor bedside manner. It was hard to believe that she’d never experienced his gruff demeanor first hand, his reputation preceded him, I had heard of him through another rider who had told me, “if you get this guy, don’t cry or quit,” he assured me to “stay with it” if I did roll into class to find this notable character – that he was, in fact, a superb instructor; much better than some of the young pretty boys they had teaching at the competitor’s school.

Turns out the head of the school confronts Instructor Ahab, throws anonymity out the window by sending him the actual blogpost with the “bad cop” comments, he now knows exactly who is behind the “complaint” and has full access to records including my home address. This, from the head of the school who’s implied motto is “safety above all else”. Once off the bikes all bets are off, it now seemed.

Now I have a blogpost I am still proud of, an easily angered biker seeing red because of it, seems “Jiggy” has been informed that I called him a “crackhead” on the internet, and I find myself wondering was it all worth it.

I would have to say, “yes!” – until I see Instructor Ahab coming towards me at a biker rally with his lip curled back and his eyes popping out at me from under his bushy brows – at which point I’m left no other choice than to yell out to the heavens, “Please, God – give me the strength to throw a knee right where it counts, run like hell, then write a damned good blogpost when (and if) I make it home.”

FAMILY DINNER

2010-10-31T11:59:00.000-07:00

I sure was hungry and anxious to see what the guy across from me would be fishing out of the murky caldron in the center of the table. There were five us sitting around the two little Formica tables pushed together, I was given my own little wire basket on a stick to ladle whatever I wanted out of the liquid I was warned wasn’t for consumption, I felt safe going for the familiar chunks of thick white potato that had picked up the flavor of the grey water. They were delicious.

It was followed by something that looked like an uncircumcised cocktail wiener, a little red bulbous tube peeping out of a pale sheet of fleshiness. “Frank,” the guy who was quickly piling goodies on my plate, spoke no English, and could only say “beef,” redundantly identifying the only item on the plate that was recognizable to me. “Emily,” the 21 year old girl who ran the place spoke a fair amount of English, said, “I don’t know what you people call this,” to whatever morsel I pointed to. Her husband looked on, lovingly at her, kindly amused by me as I pointed at each new dripping gift; they all were impressed with my willingness to eat each and every unsolved mystery on my plate.

Truth is, it was all quite tasty; the company pleasant; “Emily,” her husband, “Frank” and the delivery guy from Ecuador, who spoke little to no English but had an affinity for fine Men’s cologne which he reapplied like he was going on a date each time he ran out to make a delivery. Everyone was up and down from the table – multitasking between the bountiful feast and keeping the Friday night business hopping. Originally this dinner was planned for their entire extended family, but some little one got sick which meant the 18 that were expected had to stay home to tend to him, there must have been enough food for thirty people; fish chunks and unidentified crawlers and beef parts and pork bits all in cellophane yellow Styrofoam trays, there were bags and bags of other unidentifiables they would tear open and one by one they would plop them in the gas fueled divided metal pot before us. Emily was the only one that spoke English and boy, she loved to talk. She met her husband when she was out with some girlfriends in Coney Island. He was out with his boy friends. He had one of his boy friends tell one of her girlfriends that he thought she was nice, and the rest was history. She took him home to meet her parents, the owners of the place, they liked him because he was fresh from China, and a fine cook, they thumbs upped him for their daughter and immediately put him to work in the restaurant. A few months later the young couple gave birth to a daughter and Emily’s mom and dad found their opening to stay home from the grueling restaurant, deciding to raise the child themselves, sending the young couple to run the business full time. Emily had wanted a career in beauty, which was surprising as she wore no makeup, was a bit overweight and a tad slovenly, her sister had been allowed to go to college in Boston, which Emily pronounced “Booostone” – to pursue a degree in accounting but Emily had been given full responsibility to run the the business her parents had started – which prevented her from graduating high school by two classes. She would now have to get her GED to make something of herself but her friends told her they were all too stupid to take the test, it was “very, very hard,” she told me. I had heard the GED was difficult – an overwhelming task with a limited vocabulary, I imagined. I wanted to tell her she wasn’t stupid but she was on a breathless tear to tell me her life story, so I just nodded with each new development and let Emily’s story unfold.

She explained how she had come from China when she was 14 and how she, of course, spoke no English. “I thank a black boy for my English,” she said. She said it a couple of times, her eyes wide and grateful. “I thank a black boy for my English,” she smiled, her moon-like face glowing over the bubbling pot – the fluorescent light making it look magical as she told the story. “He said, Fuck YOU to me,” she nodded. “What do you mean,” I said, the four words I was able to slip in during our conversation. “He come up to me in school and say, ‘Fuck YOU’ to me. I say, “Thank you!” and all the kids around laugh.” She had no idea what “fuck you” meant, but she felt the pain of all the other children laughing at her that day in the lunchroom at school. She went home and asked her parents, “What do fuck YOU mean.” They explained it to her and she was “Oh very so mad.” And from that day she made it her business to learn the language. The next time the boy came up to her and said, “Fuck YOU,” she said, “you TOO,” in response, and from that day she was accepted by all the other school children as one of their own. “See!, I thank this black boy for my English!!” It was a great story, opening with the curious teaser and all, I sat next to her like a child getting a bedtime story, still sucking the tender meat out of the mystery creatures that were put in front of me.

We both sat talking, well, her talking and me listening til the boy from Ecuador started mopping and her husband was finishing up his meticulous clean up of his in-laws' take out place. I stood up and thanked them all but they were focused on their end of day tasks, Emily said, “I’m glad you eat with us, I love the big family dinner. You come please again.” I walked the half block home in the first cold night, that was nice, I thought, feeling toasty and a bit too full having eaten everything piled in front of me by “Frank”, Emily, Her Husband, The Ecuadorian Delivery Guy; my new little Chinese family.

I

2010-10-29T08:56:00.001-07:00

I eat too many eggs.
I don’t floss every day.
I’m too nice.
I’m very mean person.
I hold it all in.
I eventually implode.
I use too many “I’s”.
I don’t clean up my room.
I’m late for work.
I don’t buy eco-friendly.
I glare at tailgaters.
I pay the minimum.
I cook with butter.
I don’t do sit-ups.
I blame other people.
I blame myself.
I beg for love.
I hate myself.
I’m always right.
I get it wrong.
“I” “I” “I”
“I” “I” “I”
Oh m”I”.

PSYCHO

2010-10-28T11:08:00.000-07:00

Before he delivered my sentence, he called me, “Psycho.”

“Psycho” he said it several times, the word bullying the words around it into submission – a steady string of “Psychos,” his lifeless voice in a deafening one word chant. Walking to the subway after receiving the prognosis, shock turned into shame along the wet walk home from the train.

“Self-actualized”, “Self aware”, these are names I go by, who is this other self that goes there? Grasping at weapons, whatever happens to be lying around at the time, landline, cell phone, text messages, some well-place words, past resentments work well in machine gun fire.

The Superhero flies in pushing other selves aside; she looks like every woman – no cape, no tights, just the word “PSYCHO” printed big and red across her chest.

VIOLENT IMPACT

2010-10-27T20:45:00.000-07:00

Sudden and violent, the van slams into the cab, throwing me forward from the back seat. First thing I think, I am to blame.

The Hassid pulls out his wallet, the cabbie says he’s sorry, I admit nothing, the blame is on me.

The policeman comes, files the report, questions the drivers, smiles my way. Truth be told, Officer, I am to blame.

Today I was driving, redline raging, spiraling into lateness, spinning me towards hailing, backseat hating then impact, sudden, violent, head on from behind, there in the back, I am to blame.

THE BOX

2010-10-24T08:39:00.000-07:00

There’s a sealed cardboard box in the middle of the room, the Super finally brought it up because I’ve been avoiding picking it up for weeks.

My sister and law had it shipped, she told me it would be coming, the box inside the box marked is marked “Claudia”. She hadn’t opened it, she found the box, it was filled by my mother who now remembers my name but little else. My mom filled it back when she was invincible, she filled the box back then.

The box is unopened there in the middle of the room. I left it down there with the super, down there in the basement where I didn’t have to look at it. Now that it’s in the middle of the room "anxious" overcomes me. Anxious times sad times regret then what now.

The box and I are in a standoff. Now vs. how life used to be, when my mom was sharp, there to talk to, before she talked in sound bites, pull the string, a doll with a sweet voice answers back.

I could make room in my closet, next to the childhood stuffed toys I can’t part with, store it there next to the way things used to be.

The box would stay sealed, taped shut, out of site.

The box with my name on it; packed by my mother back when things were good.

ROMEO

2010-10-23T18:20:00.000-07:00

he downstairs
again
all textin me
like Romeo
down there
jus twenty six
miles runnin
iron pumpin
stunnin
silver tongue-in
he wants up
just to get up
in here
tryin
same as last week
n the week
before
cause I use to let
him
in

new years
he up here
chillin
ringin in
the year
cookin
winkin
cleanin
my kitchin
pullin it out
over there
in the chair
im like
why you do
that
he up
comin at me
fast
all in
my face
grabbin
I'm not
havin
hearhim
what why wo
hittin
the stairwell
blunt
still blazin
over there
by the chair
where he go
o
romeo
why
you go
n do
that

HOW DO THEY SPEAK?

2010-10-17T10:40:00.000-07:00

How do they speak? The ones who's daddy left home in the first grade, taking one suitcase, the savings account, “who will love me” lingers in curtains, the sofa, the stuffed toy rhinoceros.

How do they speak? The ones who lost interest in the third grade; steady F student majors in hitting or giving head behind the gym.

How do they speak? “WOT U DOIN NO U DIN DATS INORANT ” all caps quill. The words won’t come and fist pump finds face, face finds pavement, the DNA found beneath her nails delivers him home to Cell Block C.

How do they speak? Talkin'smack, bully stares, AK47. “What you lookin’ at, what? WHAT?!!” conversation starter.

THE JOURNEY

2010-10-15T13:58:00.000-07:00

I scanned the folding table carefully, looking for a cute souvenir between the rows of brass knuckles, knives, and swastika goodies; clearly this shopping spree was a bust. I hoped to leave the biker party with a cute little skull to hang around a chain, but I’d have to continue my search on Saint Mark’s Place or Bleeker Street, my treasure would not be found among the lovingly displayed anti-Semitic collectibles and illegal weaponry.

It was around one-thirty in the afternoon, the biker I was seeing had asked to meet for coffee around noon to give me the hundred bucks he had borrowed, and to apologize for fucking an old flame he’d invited into town two days before. She’d gotten pissed off and had split a day earlier than planned. He showed up on time which was a rarity, passed me 5 twenties, ordered 2 shots of Jack and a burger and before I knew it I was back on his bike headed to Staten Island to a biker party, location undisclosed - but not before borrowing another 20 for gas.

There were a couple of guys from his club there, one of them a sweetheart who thanked me nicely after I fetched them a couple of Bud’s and dollar shots per my date’s request. I had to stand on the sidelines; I had learned the rules a long time ago. I wasn’t to speak to anyone, particularly men, and especially those from another motorcycle club. There were bikers from one of the hardcore MC’s, they call them “outlaws” or 1 percenters, they stood in a circle, I tried not to be caught looking in their direction, someone might be beaten within an inch or two of their lives – but I didn’t know what else to do. There were some girls there, too – in their own clique, I had seen a couple of them arriving on their Suzuki sport bikes with their longs sleek black hair and 18 inch waists. I wasn’t familiar with the policy on chit chatting with biker chicks, but these didn’t look like the type of girls you call up to go to the museum with on a Sunday, or grab a nice brunch and lattes at a charming cafe – so I decided to err on the safe side and spend this lovely day staring down at my Uggs.

My other choices were perusing the illegal weapons gift table (again), seeing what fare was offered at the buffet table steamer trays, or to seek solace in the last stall in the ladies room where at least I had someone to talk to. My friend Mel was just be waking up in California, and we were conversing in texts. She wanted the update on my biker friend, what had happened with his weekend tryst, how many shots of Jack did it take for me to cave and hop back on the bike; she had been living vicariously through me – the highpoint of her weekend was usually going to Trader Joe’s on the off chance she could get lucky and find their soy product chicken fingers in stock. It wasn’t like she was jealous of me, either - she had tried to coach me out of this affair for weeks, she was the recipient of late night phone calls when he’d blown off our date for the umpteenth time only to show up at 2AM, smelling of Jack, Camels, and God knows what else - maybe cheap strippers I never dared ask. I was staying in it for the sex, the civil breakfasts where we would linger over eggs, sausage, 7-grain toast, and premium grade coffee topped off by more sex. And then there was the bike; I was in love with the bike. The roar of the throttle, the glint of the chrome, he’d start it up and gesture me to take my place behind him, barely fitting my arms around his girth we’d edge towards the sidewalk and clunk, clunk down on the pavement - the day filled with the promise of flight.

Still, it wasn’t long after that biker party that I said my final goodbye. After apologizing for the weekend tryst with an old flame, another ex flew into town after that, then another - a woman I overheard asking him if he would be staying for breakfast while we were on the phone one Saturday morning, he rang my bell that Sunday afternoon - I invited him up and asked him not to come back.

I ended up finding a cute little skull on Ebay finally, which I hung on a chain. My biker had been gone for weeks, we kept in touch on the social networking site, he was in his third relationship since we’d split - it had been a month and a half. I missed the sex, the two-hour breakfast extravaganzas, but mostly I missed the bike. Hell-bent on dating another biker just to get back on a bike, until eureka it hit me, I could actually get a bike of my own.

Yep, I could get a bike, not have to depend on a guy to go flying, maybe have a real chance at love with someone nice who has a bicycle and maybe reads The Times, you never know.

I couldn’t tell you when I fell out of love with the biker. Was it the folding table full of swastika souvenirs? Was it the pile of vaginal freshener suppositories I found by his sink - left behind by yet another ex? Was it the smell of Jack coming off him as we lane split on the Belt Parkway at 2 AM and the threat of imminent death?

The day my bike was delivered, maybe that was it; when I fired her up and clunk-clunked her down into first gear and rode off by myself. My ex-boyfriend biker friend was keeping a watchful eye over me in his side view mirror, he showed up on that first day – sober, precise in his direction, and ultimately supportive as we rode together in formation later that afternoon down Hamilton Avenue. I couldn’t have asked for a better instructor, as a boyfriend he pretty much sucked, but as I was feeling stronger, up on my own two wheels, sun shining - it was all water under the bridge.

A FORTUNATE MADNESS

2010-10-13T06:35:00.000-07:00

Martin was one of a long line of men touched with madness. I wondered why they called it “madness,” where else would great thinkers and creative geniuses be without at least a smidgeon of its magic.

To quote him, Martin was a self-proclaimed manic-depressive; on the internet they started to refer to it more as Bipolar Disorder. Big pharma, publishing, and Hollywood latched on to the phrase and took it all the way to the bank. Depending on what you read about Bipolar Disorder there were many different opinions about what caused it, and no real clear-cut definitions of how it was categorically diagnosed. It is suggested that it often runs in families, and this family appeared to be the textbook case study that proves that theory.

The first time I encountered the family gift was with Martin’s nephew, a man I dated one Spring. He had windows of brilliance during sex that would manifest in mid-intercourse soliloquies featuring narcissistic dominant themes that usually took place in a medieval setting . A rich fantastical world, highly detailed in leather, iron, stone, and sinew – circa a long long time ago. There would often take place in a cobbler’s thatched roof abode, it would certainly involve either the man’s wife or mistresses, or his staff of 12 handmaidens – but the theme basically always the same: the “hero” would have his way with the proprietor’s wife or most prized maiden in front of the poor cobbler's very eyes, who at first would be disturbed at the on site abduction, but then have a sudden paradigm shift and be greatly honored that his wife was chosen to be fucked by the slayer. I was never quite sure who the "hero" was, he wasn’t an emperor, a king, he was more of just a “slayer” – much like the ones celebrated in rock albums and video games. In the other corner there was me, present day, on the receiving end of this thickly twisted bedtime tale – he had my undivided attention as the artfully told impromptu story seemed to come from him as if possessed.

A couple of weeks later after an incident they sent him away to a mental health facility, he returned calmed, his flights of fancy barely stirring under the blanket of meds prescribed so that he could act “right” in the world.

Back then I would ask and he would sometimes feed my curiosity and tell me stories about his childhood, about his unconventional upbringing, about his father, a sometimes cruel, always demanding uber genius who was kissed by that special something which lead him to great success in the military as well as in the halls of academia. Then there were the other times, the times the “special” made him “mad”. It was brutal stuff, one time his sons had to fly in and pull a special ops mission to intercept the electroshock therapy session scheduled by their dad's psychiatrist. Years later, Dad's demons are kept mostly at bay, he’s living in Indiana, happily so with a wife, teaching at a local college. I wonder if he ever misses the old days.

So begun my brief period of fascination with Bipolar Disorder. Over a couple of months I absorbed just about everything I could on the topic, I read from reliable medical resources online, joined websites where those with BPD chit-chatted, told horror stories, where their wives, husbands, and lovers advised others on no uncertain terms to, “RUN, don’t walk, for your life.” But then there were those with BPD that celebrated it. Usually they were arrogant geniuses that somehow managed to bottled the stuff and use it to fuel art, commerce, or evil.

For some BPD is a hell inside the head with racing thoughts of terrorizing self-doubt that is beyond one's control. On the flipside, the "good times" mania is reported to often manifest in inappropriate, sometimes ethically deplorable sexual behavior, as well as flagrantly irresponsible spending binges, both behaviors often leading to personal and financial ruin, and failed romantic relationships. But as I poured through these forums, I would come across the one or two with BPD that embraced their illness, celebrated it, wouldn’t have it any other way; to them, it wasn’t a disorder or disease, it was a cherished gift. And from his proud declaration of his wildly swinging state of mental health, playfully described in the personal description box on the social networking site, Uncle Martin was one of those guys.

I unearthed his writings on the site during the period I was having historical reenactment sex with his nephew. My date's uncle, Uncle Martin was an open book, literally – he had no security settings in place for his page, he appeared to have no boundaries literally and figuratively – and in this spirit his page did not disappoint. He looked like one of the family, they were all big-boned and big-brained – his photo confirmed the former, his writings the latter. His writings were mind blowing. He posted often, and more times than not, the stories and poems were over my head which I didn’t allow to get in the way of my ability to relish them. Both enjoyable and elusive to me, they often earned comments of wry ridicule from the other family members/madmen, ridicule apparently another trait hardwired into the family DNA given their sometimes passive aggressive, subtly cruel banter on the social networking site. However, I knew better in spite of my average IQ, his content was off kilter, completely non-linear, yet always lyrical and completely original. There was one piece in particular that I actually got because it was so simple. The piece was simply about someone falling from a skyscraper window and their slow decent on to the pavement. No profundity, no epiphany – his beautiful gift for capturing the pedestrian details as they enter the mind of this average business man as he falls to his certain death. For me there was a comfort in the characters anti-climactic, cathartic descent.

Damn, those manic-depressives are good. Those first few weeks were magical wtih the guy I saw for awhile, Martin’s nephew, when he was in the thick of his mania. And his brother, too, he possessed a bit of the gift – his sometimes cruel, audaciously funny spot on observances that took the day on the comment threads. Then the father who sired them both and his mental triumphs and lessons, and this guy Martin, with his open page, no security settings, no self-editing, all raw and beautiful. He posted some “flair” recently on his web page – a virtual badge that you would put on a bulletin board or on the pocket of a favorite denim jacket that read: “I don’t suffer from INSANITY, I ENJOY every minute of it.”

This “insanity,” this “madness,” I don’t qualify for any special honors, I can only claim some average neurosis. It passed me by, I suspect that my grandmother possessed some form of clinically defined mental illness. She painted, used carefully chosen words sparingly and with quiet force. She would hand be beautifully hand written notes that were poetic and startling, and full of wisdom – reaching into her bag for small squares of paper and an ink pen, committing calligraphy to paper in front of my very eyes, she would pass them to me, folded in half. I was seven years old when she came to visit, and later on in that day she became agitated and hysterical, went running from our house to cry and wander the neighborhood returning from the darkness with my grandfather who eventually found her sobbing on a stone wall or something a street or three away. I was scared of her and also bit jealous of her and those like her: the fortunate/unfortunate ones in all their madness.

THE JEEP

2010-10-13T06:07:00.000-07:00

He’s always a Jeep in my dreams, a black one, to be specific. Sometimes the Jeep is stuck in reverse, or locked behind a chain link fence, sometimes the Jeep is slowly slipping backwards on steep steep hill. Last night the back left tire was springing a leak. I watched the rubber losing air, the rim pressing melted black rubber against the sidewalk.
A friend came to the rescue, filling it with air, I know the hole is there somewhere, I hear the slow leak, I don’t see it but I know it’s there.

One day (night) we were both in the front seat at the same time. A Sunday drive down winding roads, sure-footed tires, gas tank full, windows down all toasty inside.

Not bad for a broken down old Jeep.

JIGGY

2010-10-11T10:58:00.000-07:00

I was pretty sure that the guy sitting behind me in the classroom of my motorcycle safety course was a crack head. He stuttered and bounced into the room, a little pint sized guy all skin and bones with full-on jiggy energy, he seemed nice enough – he offered me some hand sanitizer, his hand shaking as he extended the plastic bottle my way.

We broke into teams to go over the handbook material that we would be drilled on later. The three girls in the glass teamed up and we aced the Q & A, knowing our stuff, articulating the regurgitated material fairly well. Most of the guys lagged behind us, baffled when asked to basically read back the material, the jiggy man had trouble putting sentences together it would be interesting to see how everyone would do when we hit the practice track the next day.

Up at 5 AM the next morning, I couldn’t wait to get on a bike and see what they had in store for us. I arrived a bit early along with some others. One of the instructors was running simple drills on his gigantor Harley as we watched. Jiggy showed up just in the nick of time before Monty, the stern curmudgeonly head instructor, gave us a drill sergant-esque run down of the rules of the course. We were told to pick a bike, I went for the shiny black 250 that was first in line, the instructor telling me to hold on, I had short legs and should take the diminutive 125, I assured him I could handle it’s 360 lb bulk, and left the junior 125 bike to the lesbian court officer who I swear was a full foot shorter than myself, but with twice the swagger that surely kept the instructor at bay when awarding First Prize in the Shortest Legs Division.

I had been riding my own 250 for 3 months, although still green I knew how to ride in the friction zone, find gears, brake, all the basics. The rest of the students did fairly well, some better than others, but Jiggy seemed to really excel. There is a learning curve, but there are those who you'd call “a natural”, and Jiggy fell squarely into that category. One of the other women dropped her bike, I heard it before I saw it, she must of grabbed the throttle like her life depended on it, I turned around to see her whirling dervish finish, spirally down to her final drop, hand still grabbing the throttle full tilt even as she was on her side on the asphalt. The instructor had to run over and hit the kill switch, which she later bragged about doing herself although we had all seen what really went down. Her boyfriend was an experienced rider, she told us the night before she had already picked out her first bike, some 1700cc cruiser she assured me would be "nooo problem", although it was a good 1500 cc’s over what any newbie should sport. But the instructors gave her another shot, after all – she had gotten right back up on the bike, and had shown up in a 500 dollar Vanson motorcycle jacket, but dropped the bike again not 10 minutes later. It seemed it was catching, another fellow dropped his 250 20 minutes later, his leg caught under the bike, the headlamp cover shooting across the pavement. Both were asked out of the class, the rest of us were bonding based on sheer survival.

Jiggy didn’t really seem to talk to anyone. He wasn’t the most articulate, his pint sized stature made him the weakest link to the other macho boys who paid their $350 to train that weekend. During a break he was off to the side by himself while the other guys were off peeing or trading stories about the sports bikes they were buying on Monday. The only other girl left in the class, that little butch chick was busy texting her significant other on her T-mobile slider, left alone to the side, I took the opportunity to extend some warmth Jiggy’s way.

Turned out the reason he was so slight was because he’d just completed several rounds of chemotherapy. He had been diagnosed with Lymphoma just about a year ago, had been told he wouldn’t make it the year but was one of those against-all-odds percentages, the doctor had been shocked at his progress. He booked the motorcycle course on the phone from his hospital bed, he decided he wanted to get his M class endorsement, buy a small bike, and just travel around, wherever the bike took him. He didn’t feel sorry for himself, he was matter of fact in the way he told his tale - bouncing from foot to foot with that jiggy vibe, I wondered where he got all that energy. I admired his fortitude and could relate to his plan. I hadn’t had a near death experience, but between getting mailings with the big letters “AARP” on the outside, and having the same conversation week after week with my mother who’d been diagnosed with Dementia - I couldn’t get on a bike fast enough.

After our first day on the riding course it was time to take the written exam which couldn’t have been easier. I patted myself on the back and took a huge exhale when I aced a hundred percent, most got at least a 95, Jiggy squeaked by with an 82 - so we were all invited back to complete the road training and to take the final road exam the next day.

We all showed up early, someone brought donuts. It was cold and still dark, there were ten of us left out of the original 12, I was invited into the circle of boys, all of us standing hoods up in a circle. I was one of the strongest on the track the day before, no one had been listening when I explained I had 600 miles under my belt, I used it to my advantage and let everyone think my “first day” riding was off the charts, it gained me access to the boy’s club. Jiggy was off to the side, like a runt left behind by the pack. He lacked the oomph the rest of us had, his face sunken, his body shaking in the cold, I said good morning and scolded myself for not remembering his name.

After the drill sergeant gave us a good morning verbal bitch slap, we all went over to our bikes for the next drill of the day: shifting up into 3rd gear. Seemed everyone improved from yesterday. Guys that had been lagging the day before seemed to hit their stride. The “good cop” instructor told me he wished every student was like me which was a relief to hear after “bad cop” drill sergeant took every opportunity to motivate me with the threat of an imminent FAIL.

Two of the guys were having difficulty finding 3rd gear then downshifting into 2nd. One of them was Jiggy. The other guy was a silent working class guy who looked like he had angry conversations going on inside his flat topped head. Both he and Jigs kept stalling their bikes on the drills. Drill sergeant blew his whistle and sent the rest of us over to the side. He had the good cop instructor spent about 15 minutes with them before they asking the two weak links to leave the group. Flat Top took off without a word in a hurry, I was convinced he was going to get the gun in his glove compartment and take a few of us out before heading out to his mom’s for Sunday dinner. Jiggy walked towards us with a, “that’s it, I’m OUT.” He said it while walking, we all stopped him from going off to get into his car, or going off to the bus stop, we’d never seen how he got to the parking lot in the mornings, he seemed to appear out of thin air.

“Hey, you gonna reschedule, you’re gonna take it again,” all of us lending encouragement to the little guy who had shown such promise the day before.

“Nah, I ain’t paying $350 again, I’m done,” Jiggy said with a final straw.

“Hey, don’t give up, I’ll give you lessons, give me your number,” one of the more macho guys tried to cajole him, I wasn’t the only one with a soft spot for the little corn-rowed guy – the whole gang seemed to care – even without knowing he’d been walking around with Leukemia the whole time.

“Nah, I’m done wit this shit, I had it,” all his jiggy energy went up to his head, it was shaking from left to right with an adamant “no.”

And with that he was off, his slight form quickly getting lost between the parked cars there in the lot next to the gym - his spirit spent, it’s last breaths taken on an old 250.

Six of us passed to get our M class license that day, the other 6 didn’t, some of them were asked to leave – Jiggy was one of them. I didn’t care what happened to that 6, our pumped up camaraderie null and void once the test results were passed out by the instructors. Still, I wonder what happened to Jiggy after that day, had he gotten a good night’s sleep, bought himself a bike off of Craigslist anyway to pursue his post chemo dream? Or had he really given up on bikes, on treatment, on life altogether? There would be no way to know; I hadn’t taken his number, hadn’t even bothered to get his real name.

THE DREAM MAN

2010-09-30T09:15:00.000-07:00

It looked like all my dreams would come true in a matter of weeks. I would have a house on the beach, a square jawed blonde haired genius husband, and two toe-headed kids. My husband-to-be’s mental issues aside, everything was falling into place.

He told me to get in touch with a realtor in Neponsit, an upscale beach community on the Irish Riviera, otherwise known as Rockaway Beach - a charming enclave with little houses and perfect manicured lawns just a stone's throw from the ocean.

He and I had been playing house a couple of nights a week in my apartment in Brooklyn. He would drive his Mustang convertible home from his job at a local college where he was a department head and celebrated professor. Matt Damon looks, gym hard body, shock jock sense of humor, and Mensa IQ – his violent sleep patterns had become less problematic since I started sleeping on the sofa. The sleep walking paranoid rants didn’t seem to manifest when he was left alone for his solid 5 hours of 40 winks. We had a good thing going, dinners together, chats about current events, pleasant strolls around the neighborhood, he would get up around 5 and tell me that he loved me and it was off to run 5 miles, do laps, and power lift before he had to show up to run a department around 8AM, the day fueled on a steady diet of Big Gulp Diet Cokes from 7/11.

Other than my personal safety being compromised by the genius’s harrowing sleep episodes where he would dream that he was under violent attack, that and the waking bouts of uncontrollable anger (carefully managed by him - storming out of my apartment only to return the next day shiny and new) - there was the nagging question, where was my beloved boyfriend every weekend?

At the beginning, he would paint beautiful pictures of the weekend we would have, beers and burgers on my deck, going to the beach, touring the city’s museums, but then without warning he'd go MIA until Monday morning when he would call me from his desk and change the subject when I'd inquire about the lost two days. When pressed he would say that he was teaching weekends at a school up in Connecticut, or babysitting his sister’s kids, surely I understood that these were priorities, real adults have responsibilities with more to do than take a no-limit credit card to the mall on Saturdays.

A few weeks later he casually mentioned the kids were his – “their mother” lived somewhere out in Connecticut, and he was planning on vying for sole custody, he claimed she was “unfit” - and that’s where the idyllic beach house came in, and me, of course, the suitable step mom figure. All I had to do was call the realtor, apply for a loan together, maybe make a family court appearance or two, marry him if it made things look better in front of the judge - he would take care of the rest.

The plan was questionable - my happy ending placed before me like a birthday cake with red flags flying where the candles should be. Still, I would be fast-tracking to the American Dream that my friends were living, the ones that had gotten married in their twenties and had kids by the time I was writing my first ad on Madison Ave. My future husband certainly wouldn’t be as safe and predictable as theirs, but who wanted that - besides my betrothed was a gay porn wet dream, his chiseled features, rock hard bubble butt had a firm hold on me, I wasted no time calling the realtor in the morning.

The houses were surprisingly affordable; my dream beach house was just a pre-approval away. I only needed to supply both our social security numbers to get pre-qualified from the bank; the realtor wanted to make sure we meant business before she started showing us houses in this exclusive beachfront zip code.

All I had to do was get those 9 numbers from my boyfriend, numbers I would have to pry from him with kid gloves. Inquiries beyond “Flavor Blast? Or Cool Ranch Doritos?” were always met with an unsavory response. As anticipated, the request turned the pleasant evening on its ear - sending him stomping to fetch his gym clothes from the dryer, snatching the key to the Mustang and on out the door with a slam – his grand exit compromised when he came back through the door again seconds later only to grab a couple cans of Diet Coke before heading out for exit deux.

It seemed like a good time to cut ties at this juncture; a decision timed perfectly as he never called me again. But months later, one Monday morning around the time the school session resumed after Spring break the phone rang. “Hey babe,” he sing-songed and chit-chatted as though nothing had transpired. “See you tonight around 7,” he said sweetly, “We can go for Veal Parmesan.” That was always our traditional meal: Veal Parm, Law & Order, cuddling, followed by sleep walking murder re-enactments for dessert.

“I don’t know, Jake,” the backslide to his perfect buns had begun, “What's with all the dodgy behavior?” We had to venture beyond the Doritos Q & A if things were going to work.

“You know what your problem is,” I could hear the rage escalating to a solid seven, surely after a three Diet Coke breakfast. “You ask too many questions, we could have had a very nice life together, but you threw it all away. Just remember when you look back, we had it ALL but YOU - THREW IT ALL AWAY.” He slammed down the phone in the unique way he had, the receiver never went clean into the cradle, you heard a violent fumble of plastic on plastic before the receiver actually found it’s final resting place. It always made me smile.

Had I thrown it all away, he gave me too much credit - I wasn’t sure it was the case. He left me no choice from practically day one - yet I kept buzzing him back upstairs. There at the ready with a steady supply of Doritos, Diet Coke, and the cloying fear that mentally disturbed geniuses with gay porn physiques don’t come along every day.

ONE NIGHT IN BROOKLYN

2010-09-27T10:53:00.000-07:00

I was nursing my Cosmopolitan, the bartender got it right, I thanked the gentleman who bought it for me, the Dominican who was rumored to have shot a guy in front of my apartment building a few days before.

It was a hot Summer’s evening, I had been grilling steak out on the terrace, and went back inside to cool off in the AC when I heard a startling Pop! Pop!! Those kids with those fireworks, I thought, I went outside like Gladys Krafitz to see who the culprits were. A guy from my building was wrenching his neck over the railing of the roof deck of our building, he said someone had been shot right there down on the sidewalk, smack dab in front of our building.

Sure enough, the ambulance came and whisked off the kid who was lying on the sidewalk, his Model’s t-shirt soaking up a good amount of the pint or two of blood that was escaping from his stunned body. He wasn’t dead just frozen in motion from the stun, someone had pulled up in a black SUV got out and shot him point blank – in the leg.

The cops arrived shortly thereafter and started taping off the crime scene, I had seen this on TV like everyone else, even about 10 blocks from where I lived, but never right in front of my house. It seemed like such a nice neighborhood, 2200 dollar 1 bedroom rentals, places to buy breakfast burritos and overpriced cupcakes; the next day I heard that it was a squabble over a large amount of cocaine, like a pound of it. The story went that Hefty Bags full of cocaine were moving in and out of a brownstone down the way, usually around 4 AM when no one was watching, but the old-school Italians didn’t miss much of anything, some of them in their 80’s now were finding it hard to sleep and would keep a watchful eye out from their windows, and word gets around, even to those of us who were “ruining” the neighborhood.

The detectives spent an hour or so talking to everyone in the surrounding buildings, people reported on the SUV, the rotund shaved head 30 something getting out of the car, a brief exchange of words between he and the boy in the white t-shirt, and then the two shots, seemed there was something to go on, but I never heard another word about the crime being solved, except some local intel from the guy who owned the flower shop up the street. He said word had it- it was this guy in the ‘hood I knew since he was a kid. He was this fat kid who was a real nuisance when he was younger, heckling me from across the street, arriving home by police car more often than not, but that was a long time ago, he seemed like he had turned the page, he would greet me with a “hi, Miss – how you doin’ today,” and tip his baseball cap that he never even wore backwards. It sure beat being called a whooore, which was his term of endearment for all us gals back in the day, he had really cleaned up his act. But according to my neighbor, he had got into a squabble with a guy he had fronted a pound of coke to, who also happened to be his first cousin, and had shot him not once but twice - taking careful aim in a non-life threatening area to encourage his cousin to make good on his end of the deal.

Seemed the guy at the Flower Shop had identified a solid suspect, as did most of the guys in the social clubs on Henry Street, the detectives had come up empty handed, and had seemingly moved on to other things. A friend of mine who used to head a crime unit said the detectives probably had the same info that had reached the streets, but tended to let low life characters work out their own business, particularly if the parties were "friends" that wouldn't offer up anything in the way of evidence, and only if none of the local yuppies got hit in the crossfire. The laws of the street trumped everything, and life went on. The boy who was shot was released from the hospital a day later, there was no more talk on the streets, the men at the social clubs had other more pressing business to attend to.

A couple of weeks later I decided to drop into my local bar for a beer or two, it was Friday night and the guy I was seeing was probably out with friends from work, or some woman who didn’t yet know about his formidable commitment issues. “Miss,” someone placed a hand on my shoulder, it was the Dominican fellow rumored to be the shooter, he offered a warm smile, “Please, let me buy you a drink,” he slipped into the open seat next to me at the old oak bar. He waved his posse over towards me, a huge guy with a shaved head and what appeared to be prison quality tats across his neck and arms, and his beautiful girlfriend who I imagined would be what you would encounter your first night in jail if you ever got caught doing something stupid. My old friend from across the street made the introductions, the bald guy extended his hand politely, the girl stared straight ahead as though she hadn’t heard. My neighbor and I had exchanged names, I had gone by “Whooore” so many years ago, he now wanted to know my name, he said he always liked me and just had his heart broken – he was looking for the real thing, tired of being a player, his bad boy days long behind him, I could think about it, but maybe he could be my boyfriend, he would treat me nice. The other two were now seated on the other side of my suitor, she was making it clear she and the bald man were an item by rubbing his half hard on through his Phat Farm jeans. Suddenly, the tat-necked bald friend got a call and went outside, my date said, “Will you kindly excuse me, Dear,” and followed his buddy out into the street. Now it was just me and my potential cellmate there at the bar, I thought it polite to break the ice. I noticed she was wearing a diamond watch I had spied at Bloomingdales, it was covering part of the muddied black ink that covered her hand and forearm. “Hey, I love your watch, that’s the “Diamond Deco”, right? – I was thinking about getting one.” She turned in her chair, “SO??.”, I assumed we were not destined to be besties, I returned to my drink and shut the fuck up. Our “dates” returned to our sides after deliberating outside, the night was still young, I feared. “Hey, I’m going to excuse myself at this juncture, I have to be at work early,” I realized tomorrow was Saturday, but quickly realized safe to say this crowd never had a 9-5 so my lie would not be detected. Everyone said goodbye, except for the girl who shot me an “I’ll cut you bitch” look before returning to her cold stare to nowhere. “Think about what I told you, I’d like to take you out for steak and shrimp, anyplace you want,” my Dominican neighbor said, he had been practicing dropping his Brooklyn accent for a few weeks, it seemed – he almost sounded like he read books, or The Times, or watched PBS after meeting guys with black brief cases right outside Kennedy. “Oh, I’ve got a boyfriend,” I said, referring to my commitment-phobe on again off again - who was probably out romancing a 24 year old, “it was very nice meeting you guys,” I thanked the alleged drug kingpin/possible shooter from across the way for my Cosmo; I was always sure to mind my manners, particularly in instances like these.

THE CREATIVE DIRECTOR AND THE CRACKED DOOR

2010-09-23T12:54:00.000-07:00

Sal was one of those advertising creative directors they had back in the day. He was a real working class kind of guy, if you met him on the street you wouldn’t be able to tell if he made pizzas, worked for the Department of Sanitation, or was a big New York Creative director at an ad agency, which is what he was. And he was a good one, too. He had a great creative sense, a love for the business, and a gregarious, jovial personality that made him a favorite of clients. He taught classes two nights a week down at The School of Visual Arts and was great to work for, particularly if you were kind of green in the business. He knew how to critique work and articulate why it was good, or why it wasn’t, and he always made sure to build you up so you’d want to do better the next time.

My partner, Brandy and I where always jazzed when we got an assignment with Sal. He loved good work, and saw something special in us, although we were practically just starting out. We would often shoot the breeze with him for 20 minutes or so after showing him storyboards of TV commercials we would dream up, he was always fun to be around. Respectful of us girls, generous with praise, he was like Santa Claus if he had a Brooklyn accent, a black beard, and wore 50/50 blend busting-at-the-seams shirts in lieu of the red and white suit.

He had a wife and a couple of kids that he kept photos of in Lucite frames on a sideboard where he also kept some of his awards that he’d won over the years at the agency. Besides teaching, we heard he had a modeling agency on the side, he had this friend, Lenny, who was his partner in the business. Lenny was a hack photographer, Sal would “call in a favor” and get Lenny to shoot product shots for clients that had limited financial resources. Lenny lacked any subtleties when it came to still photography, shooting cans of shaving cream on overly glossy black plastic with God rays behind it, but the clients couldn’t seem to tell the difference between he and the top dollar guys who had lofts on 23rd street and did deodorant shoots to support their art gallery level work which never paid the bills.

Sal was the brains of the modeling agency, we heard he scouted the talent, and Lenny was ready with his bag of tricks, a couple of SLRs, a range of lenses, and various back drop scenes like tropical islands or posh 5th Avenue apartments.

Brandy and I were moving to offices across the hall from Sal, we were his star team, and worked closely with him on a toy account. We were told the inside offices were an upgrade, which you could tell by counting the numbers of ceiling tiles that made up your space. If you counted and increase of 4 or more tiles, you were on the fast track. If you counted less tiles, it was time to look for a job. Between the two of us, we had an increase of 10 tiles so were figured we were on fire, and we partly had Sal to thank for that.

With Sal just across the hall, we started to notice a lot of activity between the hours of 12 and 3 in the afternoons. There was a steady stream of pretty girls, “pretty” in a cheap way you could say, but thin with long hair, and if they wore less make up and shopped less at the big discount stores next to Grand Central Station and maybe invested in facials to offset the breakouts from the dime store makeup – they might really have something. Scuttlebutt had it that Sal and Lenny’s Modeling Agency had no actual storefront, and no actual name, the bricks and mortar of it was Sal’s office that faced the 40th side of the agency. Girls would come and go between 12 and 3, and sometimes later, Lenny was usually there to help with the talent. The girl, usually in the 15-16 year-old age range would walk in, we’d hear Sal tell them to close the door behind them, then around 3 the activity would cease. After wrestling with the temperamental metal Venetian blinds behind his desk, the afternoon sun would flood in and Sal would ask us to wait while he ran to bring back a sandwich from the corner Italian deli. Brandy and I would wait patiently, we were always excited to show him work, we loved our jobs, the account we were on. If everything went right we would be on a plane to L.A. to shoot our first TV commercial.

As time went on we noticed that Sal was becoming less and less available to us, his modeling agency hours were taking up most of the afternoon, sometimes up until 5, at which point Sal’s portly wife and equally well-fed kids would come to visit after taking in a movie or a show – the four of them leaving together to grab the train out to Long Island.

One afternoon we had a big client meeting the next day, and hadn’t been able to get any time with Sal, he had postponed twice with us already, it was nerve wracking – if the creative director didn’t like the ideas you put in front of them you’d be back to square one and have to start from scratch. At this point we had less than 24 hours before we had to get on a train to our clients, and Sal was already 20 minutes late for our 3 o’clock. His door was closed, we had seen a young girl go in there with a portfolio around 2:15, per usual, Sal had asked her to close the door. Soon, it was 3:45, if we didn’t get in there soon we were surely in for an all-nighter with even the simplest revisions. We listened at the door, no voices could be heard, just a quiet sound, “ka-poo. ka-poo, ka-poo.” White flashes of light were coming from the space under the door - it was now 4 o’clock. After making sure nobody was coming down the corridor, Brandy got down on her hands and knees with her face pressed against the carpet to get a visual. “Oh My Fucking God, Claud,” she got up, dusting off her seersucker squirts. “There are two BARE FEET - right there,” she said pointing down towards the bottom of the door.

“This is fucking baaad,” she said, gaining momentum, “I’m goin’ in,” I shrugged an OK, I was glad that she was the one volunteering to bust Sal in the middle of his “meeting’.

BANG BANG BANG, Brandy pounded on the door. It was silent. The ka-poo’s went silent, we heard some scurrying, the flashing light under the door went dark. BANG BANG BANG, Brandy wasn’t relenting. Sal opened the door a crack, he appeared to be alone there with Larry who was awkwardly leaning against the air conditioning unit trying to appear nonchalant. “What is going on, Sal – we have a meeting tomorrow,” she pushed against the door - which was a formidable opponent wedged against Sal’s rock hard belly. And then we saw it through the cracked open door, it was there on Sal’s sofa, a small flesh colored bra, dingy and well-worn but neatly folded on the arm of the agency-issued love seat. We didn’t see a third party anywhere, just Sal’s sweaty face through the door crack, and his photographer/accomplis who now appeared to be seeking creative inspiration by leafing through an awards book annual. The bare naked feet and the young girl attached to them were apparently hiding in the corner, there behind Sal’s half cracked open door.

“This is fucked,” Brandy said as we backed into her office to discuss next steps. “I don’t know about you, but this is unacceptable,” she was going to march straight up to the creative director’s office, a woman who practically invented girl-power – she was just about the only female in the place at that level, and she ruled the roost. I, of course followed in Brandy’s huff although I could have just gone shopping instead - but we were a team, after all. I didn’t want to steal her thunder, the bare feet, the bra, and the BANG BANG BANG – she had bragging rights to this whistle blow if it went the right way, but I had to at least be in the room. It was like a great creative idea, everyone claims credit who happened to be standing in the room at the time when the guy first said it. Plus, it was hard to get an audience with the big lady creative director, but unauthorized photography shoots of under aged naked girls on agency premises? Chances are she would wave us right in.

Breathless, Brandy described the events that transpired around 3PM, she didn’t embellish, she didn’t have to – the naked facts spoke for themselves. “I see,” the lady creative director cocked her head slightly, not tipping her hand, “thanks for stopping by,” her nod seemed to show us the door.

By the time we got back to our floor, Sal’s door was shut again, it appeared he had left for the night, Larry was long gone for sure. The next day the account people called to tell us the client meeting had been postponed until the next week. It was 11 AM, Sal was nowhere in sight, he was usually one of the first ones there in the morning, but 12 PM, 2 PM, 3 PM came, the usual business hours of the modeling agency came and went; we never saw Sal again.

We heard his School of Visual Arts classes were still going strong, his students recommending him to all their friends. Rumor in the halls had it that he and Larry were going to make a go of it, they’d rented out an office in a strip mall a couple towns away from his house on Long Island; on-the-cheap product photography for clients on a budget and a class-act modeling agency for young girls with big dreams.

A LOVE STORY

2010-09-22T16:18:00.001-07:00

He drove straight over when she announced she was suddenly pregnant, he had already started fucking this other chick even though they hadn’t been broken up for more than 23 hours, hadn’t bothered to change the sheets, you had to feel sorry for the girl, but then she called him, or sent him a text, I didn’t know which with the news. How did it read, “I M PRGNT” would be economical and to the point, and just as game changing. His heart did cart wheels, I had to wonder could it be a tactic, I knew a guy who’s ex lied about having cancer to get the guy back, people are capable of crazy things. But he believed in happy endings and this was a dream come true, he said, although he always had a policy that he never wanted kids, he made it clear to women he romanced, pulling out, his chosen method of birth control, with a 73% rate of accuracy, I imagined. This no-kids-policy was non-negotiable; he hadn’t the time - he liked to watch a lot of Spike TV, his job at UPS took up the rest of his days, ice hockey on Thursday nights - he surrendered his cat to the local shelter, “I want to be fair to the cat,” he said – yet this news sent him over the moon, people are full of surprises.

He did the noble thing, he called up the girl he had been drunk fucking the night before and gave her the good news and the heave-ho – he had a baby to think about, prodding some chick smelling of tequila paled in comparison, even if she did go into overdraft at Victoria’s Secret, he would man up – marry the girl, pick out cribs, bandy about names over two meals and a shared app at The Olive Garden. He wanted to be there when they took that little snap shot that looks like a Polariod with swoosh lines, he would leave the remote buried between the cushions, ask for the afternoon off from captaining the brown truck, maybe not get too too drunk on Saturday night; he was willing to sacrifice, there was a baby on the way.

The Dr’s visit never materialized. Sometime the following week his gal fell off the radar for a few hours, she mumbled something later that it wasn’t meant to be. The whole experience had brought them closer, like the cliché says, but in this case it was true and they were happy and looking for houses somewhere in Northern New Jersey, just far enough away from the landfills so you couldn’t really smell them and the houses were still affordable.

HER COUNTRY STORE

2010-09-22T07:05:00.000-07:00

Pleasantly full, I call to thank him for my omelet w/rye toast, butter on the side, but he doesn’t pick up. Two minutes later I see his truck again, parked in front of her country store.

They used to be an item, that’s polite “for fucking”, she put her socks in his drawer without asking; he said she was a hysteric, unstable, “she’s somebody else’s problem now”; but I always see his pick-up truck right out front there, right on-the-dot to rescue her.

One morning he told me, “I’ll be over to help you” some eight months ago. A man to fix things; holes in my ceiling. tiles to grout, a light fixture for the island. The makeshift fixture hangs, a burned out bulb, glaring.

He’s busy this Saturday – hauling her heavy load, helping her get off the ground, just being there, she barely has to ask. So much joy in the rescue, I think – sitting there by the window, I hear his truck pass by again, on its way to her country store.

SOLO

2010-09-16T09:32:00.000-07:00

Dear Santa or God, please send me someone to ride with. Cal sees that look of want and says we’ll go some day this week definitely, it’s the thought that counts, I say, “great!” and “psyched!” knowing full well he’ll spend the week laying down flooring and ordering kitchen cabinets, he’s a grown up after all. I admit it, “desperate” is the only word for it – not for love or sex, I’m good, thanks – but someone to ride with is just as “sad”?? Desperate times/desperate measures – that’s what the internet is for but jeesh I don’t want to shower with you/don’t want a massage WTF I just want to RIDE, please leave your wee-wee out of this. Open invitation Wednesday nights at New York Scooter Club– chicks give me their backs, men under their thumbs– shifting in their 300 dollar SIDI boots risking punishment just to throw me a quick chit-chat that will earn them a certain scolding before bedtime. They’re riding tonight the full 20 minutes to Queens for souvlaki at this place that got 48 write ups on YELP – jeesh, my tachometer needs to get a life. Just send me someone who doesn’t have a job or a dog or a watch. I get real lucky sometimes - he idles up next to me at the light, we clunk-clunk into first at the very same time and start the dance, you first, then me: weaving, soaring, like a one night stand where no one gets hurt. Pretty-eyed Darth Vader – that 1100 bores quickly and you’re off to Coney Island or Rockaway or God knows where else with no goodbye because that’s just how it is. Maybe I’ll fill up, get me some of those chicken strips and lemonade – stand back from the counter, please, over there by the condiment station just follow the smell of raw onions clutching my receipt in front of me waiting for my number to be called, is that a six or an eight?? Next to me the sunburned guy with the bad ink and the 10k Jesus chain who’s busy texting his girlfriend while his wife in Juicy sweats that shows her cellulite off to it’s best advantage holds the table with their five kids who expand their verbal dexterity with words they picked up from strangers yelling out of car windows on the Belt Parkway. They shut their traps for a moment – almost seem like kids when the guy who makes the balloon animals finally gets to their table. I should ride and ride ‘til Exit 42 in Connecticut where people still get married and shammy their bikes and shop sweep their garages but Brooklyn is where I’m at; it’s where I ride solo.

FOR THE LOVE OF BERNHARD

2010-09-15T12:35:00.001-07:00

I never liked men with European accents but I was falling hard for Bernhard. He wasn’t my type, zero percent body weight, perfectly starched and fitted Diesel Brand shirts, Adidas (which he pronounced ah-dEE-DAAAHS) with laces that appeared to be bleached and pressed – yet he was growing on me fast. They put me together with him as a creative team at the agency where I worked, he had arrived in this country just weeks ago and was rumored to be a creative genius which proved to be true within the first hour of working together. He was a goldmine of brilliant out-of-the-box ideas.

No matter how horrible the assignment (we were quickly put on a big pharma pitch) he would make it fun and challenging. He raised the bar on creative ideas and I was challenging myself to jump higher with each new challenge, whether it was a radio spot that would run 10 times, or a crappy coupon ad, Bernhard said it had to be at “that level”.

He was a boarding school boy from a family of aristocrats – complete with a trust fund and a Rolex watch that he would let me wear like a boyfriend watch. He broke it off with his girlfriend of ten years when he came here to America and was staying with his good friends here, Michael and Sarah. There was never a dull moment with Bernhard, he would breeze in around 11 and say with his clipped staccato cadence, “So. My. Love. What. Will. We. Do. Today!!” We would have some unseemly assignment, but whatever it was, with Bernhard had to make it great, “The. Great. Idea. Will. Not. Happen. In. This. Shit. Office.” And with a, “Lunch?” he would whisk me off in a cab to some fancy eatery where we would work, drink, and eat crab cakes. Then it was back in a cab to the West Village to this little favorite record shop of his to buy LP’s of the latest dance beats, he was a huge fan and DJ hobbyist to add to his joie de vivre cred. Then it was off for two scoops of the best ice cream in the city, Bernhard had been here but a couple of months, but he was showing me a New York I had only seen in movies. He had a passion for the business combined with a real distaste for the office – so much so that my manager left me a voicemail one afternoon, “it would be nice if you two could occasionally stop by the agency,” but it was all good; we were hitting it out of the park – Bernhard was the best partner I’d ever had. And I was falling for him hard.

Bernhard and I spent breakfast, lunch, and dinner together – but the weekends were saved for his roommates, Michael and Sarah, to whom he seemed incredibly close. Bernhard would sneak out early on Fridays, “I’m. Going. With. Michael. And. Sarah. To. The. Hamptons. Soo. Lovely.” But I would dearly miss him over the weekend, we were glued at the hip Monday through Friday but weekends he would never so much as pick up his phone. One Friday afternoon he was packing up his man bag in a hurry so I asked, “Hey, Bernhard, maybe Michael and Sarah would like a weekend to themselves.” “What!,” he rolled his head in joy, “They. Love. Me. We. Have. Too. Much. Fun,” and he’d be off with a kiss. A few more weeks went by, I had more and more portfolio pieces for my book – Bernhard was the best thing to happen to me in the ad business – he was a great hugger, would hold my hand in cab rides to expensive restaurants, I was a goner. There was just this business about Michael and Sarah.

It was a crisp Fall Monday morning, Bernhard appeared at my office door, “Hey. Bay. Bee. Let’s. Rock.” We strolled over to Bryant Park, it was chilly, and Bernhard took off his 300 dollar Diesel Jacket and put it over my shoulders. “Come. Sit. Let’s. Talk.,” he led me over to two open seats on the lawn, “So. I. Have. Something. To. Tell. You.,” I couldn’t imagine, did he have a girlfriend, a wife and kids somewhere, what was with the lost weekends. He held my hand, “You…Know… Michael. And. Sarah…,” he said in a slow staccato, “Well. There. Is. No. Sarah.” He went on, “And. Michael. And. I. Are. In. Looove.”

Bernhard was flying high with this news finally off his chest, he didn’t seem to notice that the color had drained from my face. He giddily explained that had been hetero his entire life, had met an English banker 25 years his senior at a restaurant his first week in New York, Bernhard and he decided they were soul mates and had been together ever since. They were both well traveled, both spoke 5 languages, and had a passion for dancing and doing ecstasy until five in the morning. Bernhard had moved into Michael’s apartment and was living the gay life in NYC unbeknownst to his friends, family, and until five minutes ago, me. Bernhard popped out of his chair, grabbed both my hands and said, “Come! Come. See. Our. Beautiful. Home!” I had no time to process or protest, we were once again in a cab on the way to his Upper West Side homosexual soul mate love nest.

“I’m. So. Excited. To. Show. You. My. Dear,” he said, unlocking the door to the pre-war apartment that I’m sure his lover Michael snagged back in the day when he was young. There were fine English antiques everywhere, beautiful oriental rugs, and Robert Mapplethorpes on just about every inch of the walls. Expensive black and white prints, pristinely matted, professionally framed photos of naked twenty something men. Raw shots of men’s butt cheeks, men’s butt cheeks with horsewhips inserted in their anuses, men’s uncircumsized penises in bubble wrap. “Isn’t. This. Won. Der. Ful!” is wasn’t a question, I needed a glass of water. The kitchen was large and smelled like last night’s dinner although it was immaculate, save for a glass plate with white powder by the breadbox, “This. Weekends. Party. Favors,” Bernhard said with glee, the horse tranquilizer had a step-by-step preparation process, the men were proficient in the kitchen.

The cat was now out of the bag and now Bernhard’s felt he had a carte blanche to talk ad nauseum about Michael. He would describe their love making in graphic detail, how Michael had slowly broken Bernhard into homosexual lovemaking, Bernhard was the receiver. I lost my taste for crab cakes, the ten dollar glasses of wine, the trips to the little LP shop, it all took on a different flavor.

Our partnership was halted a couple of months after that, Bernhard had to find a better paying job, his partner Michael had quit his banking job, had “borrowed” most of Bernhard’s trust fund, and wanted to buy the apartment next door and break down the wall. Bernhard had become sole bread winner – and when I ran into him years later, we hailed a cab and had lunch at one of our old haunts. Bernhard had become a creative director at an agency who’s heyday had come and gone, he was on a terrible account forced to do terrible work to keep the client happy, he was now a slave to the big bucks, he had a whopping mortgage to pay, as well as having to throw Michael’s old lover some money now and again. He grumbled that Michael had to Get. Off. His. Ass. And get a job – he hadn’t lifted a finger since they day he walked away from Wall Street, I didn’t know the likelihood of that happening, I imagined that he was now well into his seventies. Bernhard still had his passion for club music, we strolled over to the little LP shop but it had gone out of business, then strolled a bit more before Bernhard said grumpily, “I have to get back to those fucking agency people,” his staccato now subdued, his job as a CD had sucked the life from him. I had been laid off from my agency job of 21 years - I was enjoying the farewell bag of money they had given me for signing the “I sign away all rights to sue your ass” agreement, life was good. I was seeing a mentally ill Physics professor who looked like Matt Damon who was keeping me on my toes by rarely showing up when he was supposed to and exhibiting borderline psychotic behavior when he did – his hairless gym body, Mensa-sharp wit, and calling me “baby” like he meant it was still gaining him access to my crib for the time being. “You. Are. Fucked. Up. Like. All. Single. Woman. In. New. York.,” Bernhard said with a window of staccato before giving me one of his world-class hugs and hopping in a cab; I didn’t know if I would ever see him again. He seemed so different, he’d gained 40 pounds, soured on the business, bitched about his spouse – he was pretty much like all the other beaten down ad hacks who had seen better days. But Bernhard had turned me on to great work, great food, and repetitive disco beats. He showed me how screwing around is fuel for the creative process and let me feel the cock ring through his slim Euro-jeans one day in the client’s lobby. Bernhard was one-of-a-kind and I had loved him back then, that was until the day we took a walk to Bryant Park, the day my whirlwind tour of New York took an abrupt left turn and there would be no turning back.

THE MARRIAGE COUNSELOR

2010-09-09T14:35:00.000-07:00

You could cut the air with a knife; me and this marriage counselor standing face to face - she was frozen, I was fuming, it was 3 minutes into our first session. Dave, my fiancé, had gone to the bathroom and came back into the tiny room where the two of us stood, he could immediately tell that something had already gone terribly wrong.

“What’s goin’ on,’ he said slowly with an uh-oh voice. He had dragged me into counseling, things had gone downhill since we’d become engaged three months before, this was last stop before Splitsville.

“I simply asked her if she did mostly couples counseling or individual,” it was my attempt at small talk while Dave excused himself to pee, “and SHE responded, ‘and which would YOU prefer I did’.” Dave shook his head in further dread, the lady shrink stood frozen, wearing an overly starched old-fashioned floral frock with a high neck that hung like a curtain down to her ankles – circa Little House On The Prairie; her tightly cropped perm helmeted her plain expressionless face reminding me of a Duplo figure.

“I ask a simple question about her p-r-a-c-t-i-c-e-,” I scanned the tiny back room of her Park Slope apartment which barely had room for her Mission oak chair and the beat up old futon that we would apparently be calling “home” for the next few weeks, between the two seats sat a tiny wooden coffee table with the mandatory box of Kleenex – she couldn’t have been a day over 32 but somehow felt much older, about 70-ish. “How would YOU prefer I would have responded,” she retorted with feigned calm, her deer in the headlights expression betraying that she was not in control.

“Hechhhh, never mind,” I plopped down and was quicksanded into the recesses of the old futon, Dave sitting next to me perched on the edge, holding on for dear life.

“O.K., then,” she said hands on lap, broomstick posture, “these are my rules: Come every time. Come on time. Pay every time. Am I clear?” I was waiting to see how long the woman could go without blinking. Dave and I nodded; I pulled out my checkbook, her hand shot out at me, “END of session.” My checkbook receded back into my bag.

She had come highly recommended from a co-worker of Dave’s, a woman who had been screwing some guy behind her husband’s back for a couple of years but had suddenly found some remorse and was trying to get things back on track. “My name is Julie Bradshaw,” she still hadn’t moved a muscle,” but you are to call me Mrs. Bradshaw. Not “Julie”. Not “Mrs. B”. Simply ‘Mrs. Bradshaw.’” I had been to a real shrink down on 12th Street, with credentials on the wall, leather bound books, and a real leather sofa that you could lie down on, and REAL Kleenex tissues, not the generics, and he was fine with “Gary”. “OOkay,” I nodded. Dave was shifting nervously on the edge of the futon, contributing the further demise of the tattered fabric beneath his butt.

“This is what I do,” her scripted intro continued, “I keep couples together, no matter what.” My chest was tightening, I had tried to break up with Dave a couple of times and was here pretty much here as a courtesy so I could leave the relationship with a clear conscience. “I will see you to the point that you’re married, throughout the marriage, I will help you raise your children, the treatment continues on for life," she went on with the sentencing, “Unless, of course, you decide to break off the relationship, in which case we will come to that decision together, and I will lead you through the breaking off process. Treatment will continue on from there, at which point I will see you both for individuals therapy.”

You could tell she made this exact same speech a hundred times before, she seemed to be reading it from somewhere, just over our heads on the dingy wall behind us – her eye contract slightly off by a half inch or so. We were already 58 bucks into this thing, when was our chance to talk? I looked over at Dave, was he second-guessing this couples counseling thing, or thinking about basketball. I tried to prompt her on with a nod and an affirmative, “O.K.,” I was curious to see what she had – again the hand darted out, and settled back into her lap as she finished her soliliqui. “If you should see me in the street, I will pass you with no acknowledgment, do not be offended. If we should see each other at a party, or other social context we shall proceed as though we’ve never met. Should introductions be made you will simply say, ‘nice to meet you’, this is in the interest of privacy.” I was wondering if someone said to us at a Bar Mitvah, “hey guys, this woman dressed in Mormon attire is my good friend, Julie,” if we should respond, “Nice to meet ya, Juleee-I mean Mrs. Bradshaw.” I had found a loophole but resisted the opportunity to point it out as we would soon be out of time.

“O.K., now let’s get to work,” her shoulders relaxed an eighth of an inch. I nodded, Dave settled back stiffly into the futon, the room went silent. She stared at us. We stared back. The pregnant pause continued, grew wider; to her credit Mrs. Bradshaw blinked a couple of times, probably out of necessity. I looked at her, looked over at Dave, looked at the generic box of tissue, then back at our new therapist, no one said a word – Mrs. Bradshaw finally breaking the silence, “O.K., we’ve come to the end of our session, you can make your payment now,” she watched as I filled out the check for a hundred and twenty five dollars and handed it over to her, she folded it precisely in half and tucked it in a manila folder that appeared out of nowhere. She stood as we stood, folded her hands in front of her and looked down at her feet as her hand gestured us towards the door.

Things went downhill from there. We heard from the woman who had recommended her that she had heard through the grapevine that Mrs. Bradshaw’s marriage was headed towards divorce. The sessions were fruitless, Mrs. Bradshaw seemed depressed, lackluster, and not particularly cut out for a career in her chosen field. After Dave and I agreed, I called Mrs. Bradshaw leaving her a message telling her that we had decided not to return. She in turn left us countless frantic messages like a scorned girlfriend, each message increasing with threatening tenor, insisting that it would be her decision when the process would end. She finally stopped calling after I picked up the phone and threatened her with a restraining order. Dave moved out about a month later, I started my life as a single gal, feeling lighter than I had in months.

A couple of years later I was shopping in Park Slope, I had stopped into a jewelry store that featured local Brooklyn artisans, a pretty young woman with long curly hair, jeans, and a peasant top was looking at a ring, and nuzzling affectionately with what appeared to be her cute girlfriend who was similarly dressed. The woman looked up and was trying to catch my eye – she looked so familiar; it was Mrs. Bradshaw. She had dropped Mr. Bradshaw, got herself a good therapist, a pretty girlfriend, put on a sexy top and grew her hair long. She smiled at me, but I adhered to the rules she set in place at that very first session; I walked past her without acknowledgment out on to 7th Avenue, leaving Mrs. Bradshaw, or Julie, or whatever name she went by there with her girlfriend to pick out their rings.

MADISON AVENUE SAGA

2010-09-02T12:16:00.000-07:00

It was the kind of shoot that made being in the ad business all worthwhile. Staying out in Santa Monica on the beach at a hotel crawling with celebs, the location: a mansion in Malibu overlooking the ocean, shooting with a world famous model, traveling with my best friend and creative partner, and the account exec who was fucking the guy I had been in love a short while ago, who was busying herself planning the double funeral of the twin fetus' they had lost first term, between checking her messages, crying quietly, and going over the client’s financials for the coming year.

I never really liked Lisa, she was pushy, overbearing, and braggartly bright. She had straight blond hair cut in a razor sharp wedge, a tennis body – muscular and taught, with calf muscles that would shine when the light hit her pantyhose just right. She had dumped her husband for the guy I used to like, Lenny, and she was going in for the kill. The qualities that made her a killer account executive, (can-do, and by whatever means possible) made her cloying in a social capacity. Lenny had come from a humble background, his smarts, charm, and composing abilities had lifted him from his wrong side of the tracks background and landed him firmly in an ad agency, his long hair, good looks gave him pretty much his pick of anyone at the veritable candy store of hot chicks that made up our Madison Avenue shop. Lisa had spied him, we all did. They worked together on a high tech account, spending countless hours together, late nights and weekends at her and her husband’s house. Rumor had it that she and Lenny would be fucking out by the pool while her husband was fast asleep in their bed. Pretty soon Lisa and Lenny were out as a couple, Lisa filed for divorce, and in the shake of a lamb’s tail she was pregnant with twins, she did everything short of sending out an inner-office memo, and Lenny clearly had gotten more than he bargained for. One minute he was starting out at a small agency in Stamford, the next thing he knew he was making big bucks and fucking any woman he wanted at one of New York’s top shops and at first glance, Lisa seemed like the grand prize. Platinum blond hair, played tennis at a country club, Master’s degree a couple of times over, he’d just never expected that she’d divorce her husband and toss out her birth control ¬– but Lisa had the determination and brass balls that kept three of the agency’s most important clients happy, and now she had Lenny beholden to her, too.

I couldn’t lie, it hurt like the dickens. Lenny had once sneaked up behind me while I was at the copy machine, churning out scripts for a meeting I had with our yogurt client. “I was listening to Prokofiev last night, imagining I was fucking you,” he whispered in my ear like Satan on Valentine's Day. We had never spoken before. I was winding down out of a relationship that had lasted 9 years, the last 8 years of which the sex had rapidly dissipated. I didn’t know who Prokofiev was, but I was sure as heck going to head over to Tower Records at lunchtime to buy the CD and find out what all the excitement was about. Lenny strung me along for weeks with promises to go out after work, before he’d catch the 9:05 out to Stamford, but it only materialized once or twice when he worked me into a tizzy with his sublime footsie skills. I’d go by his office during the day to get my fill of dirty talk, but each time a procession of other women from the creative department would stop by; Lenny’s office was a deli counter of dirty talking. I was devastated when a particularly pushy brunette I worked with and never liked, Jenna, had a coming out party to announce that they were officially fucking on a regular basis, an event to which I was invited, which I accepted in the hopes that I could “win” him back. Lenny sought me in her bedroom and recapped his turrets of poetic filth.

The other guy’s at work were perplexed by Lenny’s popularity with the ad women, his long hair often unwashed, he hadn’t made the switch to 100% cotton yet, his too tight 50/50 blend shirts seemed wildly inappropriate for client meetings, his off the charts genius never seemed to translate well into the pedestrian, yet tricky solutions he was asked to come up with, he often lost out in our creative shoot outs. Still, a lot of us gals swooned to his advances. Me, this girl Marta also who I swore was gay, was a regular in Lenny’s dirty talk virtual deli line, and a whole bunch of others. But Jenna won the shoot out but was soon dumped in favor of the blond with the tennis calves and her weekend house she shared with her sleepy husband. Ashamed that I had been so stupid to pick him as my first crush after a nine year relationship, I took comfort that I wasn’t alone - the number’s climbed into the double digits as a string of shattered ad girl crushes littered Lenny’s wake.

It wasn’t surprising that Lisa had won - she was a goal-oriented gal, and wasted no time filing for divorce. She made darned sure we all knew she had triumphed; she and the polyester robed prince were often found making out in the agency’s lobby, right in front of Annie’s Lobby Shop. Annie was a holocaust survivor, had seen the worst of what humankind had to offer, yet showed shock and disgust towards the couples anything but subtle displays of affection in front of the Mounds, Necco Wafers, and pretzel snacks. Not only was Lisa pregnant with twins and planning a wedding to Lenny ASAP, she was the head account person on my yogurt account so I had a pipeline to her ob gyn updates, possible locations for their honeymoon; nor would she hesitate to ask my advice on how to hurry her husband out of the house they once shared and into the small studio she had found him in a crap neighborhood in the outskirts of Brooklyn so that she and Lenny could move into the 3 bedroom house and start their new life together. Advertising was tough enough; creative shootouts with anywhere from three to ten other teams, trying to come up with the stuff after staying out all night drinking margaritas, keeping up with the witty repartee with everyone from the custodial staff to the CEO, and now this.

One afternoon I was finessing a script, or “polishing a turd” as one of my creative directors called it, “HEY!,” Lisa popped into my doorway with the starling suddenness of a marionette, not bothering with the common courtesy of a ‘tap-tap’ at the door frame when you see someone bent over their work. “What, Lisa. Bus-yyy,” it didn’t seem to knock the wind out of her sails. “You know how you liked Lenny,” she said teasingly, jeeze, I had a meeting in 9 minutes. “Uh-huh,” I said, not looking up. “And I like Lenny, right,” incorrigible. “Spit it out,” come ON already. “Well, I figure, we have the same taste in men, and now that my husband’s single…,” wow - she had to be fucking kidding me. “NO, Lisa, no WAY,” we had a new low on insult to injury, “No. Fucking. WAY,” I repeated for clarity’s sake. “Okay! Okay! I just thought….” I missed the rest of her sales pitch as I forced her to the other side of the slammed door. “See you at our four o’clock!,” she chirped, making adjustments in audio to compensate for the density of the metal door, a passive aggressive reminder that we weren’t done - we had a meeting together later in the day.

Not more than 8 minutes later the phone rang, two rings, outside call. “Hello??” a meak, almost male voice was on the other end, “is this Claudia,” he squeeked. “Yes,” the balls, the incredible balls. “This is Mike Mustow, I was Lisa’s husband before,” he said sadly, asking me out on a date.

I shook my head at Lisa as we all took seats around the conference room table at our meeting later that day. We were going over the shoot details, soon we would be flying out to L.A. for a week and a half of production. I was so looking forward to getting out of Dodge, the pool at the hotel, expensing meals at 4 star restaurants, flirting with the cute guys at the production company. We were wrapping up the final details around five o’clock, I had brought my purse and jacket so I could sneak out and grab the subway home nice and early. “Guys,” Lisa said, firmly putting the kibosh on my plan, “listen, I was thinking, if we don’t fly business, we would have enough in the budget for Lenny to come along!” Wow! I thought, the woman’s balls had grown so big you could see them pressing through her freshly dry cleaned pencil skirt. The room went silent, which Lisa promptly took as confirmation, “Good, then it’s all set!” Yes, it was. I had a date with Lisa’s forlorn ex husband on Thursday night, and Lenny would be tagging along on our Malibu shoot the week after.

The days before the shoot went by quickly. Lisa’s husband Mark had delivered as promised, crying in his sushi, making puppy-like wimpering noises during my sympathy hug, which he punctuated with new found confidence, forcing his thick saliva’d tongue in and out of my mouth. After quelling his advances, I paid him forward to a lonely friend who later told me that he now referred to me as “that lesbian dyke.” She, however found him smart and kind and lovable in spite of his impossibly small “is it in yet” penis; apparently it was a tiny head attached to his mound with no shaft twixt the two, but the size of his heart made up for it, she said, sighing. They exchanged “I love you’s” and were thrilled to have found each other. A week later, he stopped returning her calls, had apparently taken “Tiny” out to the big city see what else was out there. Next, Lisa reported in one of our pre-production meetings that she had a miscarriage, the twins didn’t make it, I gave her what was now my trademark sympathy hug. She cried quietly as I held her and announced that she had asked the doctor to keep their “remains”, that she was going to have a full burial out in Connecticut, and that I would be invited.

A couple of days later we called the shiny black cars to take us to the airport, Lisa would be meeting Lenny at the gate, he had a client meeting and would catch up with us, but he never showed. Lisa sat on the plane next to an open seat, tears streaming, refusing both the snack and the cheese stuffed chicken breast the stewardess was offering, opting for the packet of tissues instead.

The hotel was lovely, the director was a rich boy UCLA film school graduate, born and bred in Southern California, he showed me pictures of a more buff version of himself from his surfing days. The agency wasn’t allowed to speak directly to the top model on set, her acting abilities were limited, delivering bad take after bad take to camera, but the star-struck client didn’t seem to notice. The location was stunning, the weather was perfect, my partner and I rented a Jag, things had turned out OK. Lisa sat in her director’s chair, making sure the client was happy between making calls to Connecticut to book a priest for the funeral and to the funeral home to order the tiny tombstones she had picked from a catalog she showed us over dinner one night at this super place in Venice Beach. She had tried and tried to reach Lenny, but he was never at his desk, and wasn’t picking up the phone at the house she had once shared with her ex-husband. She spoke to the receptionist back at the agency to pick up her messages; one of them was from Lenny, “I can’t do this anymore,” 4:29 pm/Wednesday, the day before. She called him in front of all of us on the courtesy phone they had set up for the agency, Lenny picked up as his desk, their conversation was brief, she grabbed her Diet Coke and ran out. I followed her out and was consoling her by the infinity pool, the ones that look like they flow directly into the Pacific. The wedding was off, she had to stay strong, she said– there was still a funeral to plan. I rubbed her muscular back to calm her sobs, I heard the director yell back on set, “Cut!! It’s a wrap!” I had missed the shooting of the final scene of the commercial, when I saw the footage the super model had gotten the read all wrong, but this was never going to be my Tour De Force anyway. Lenny abruptly left the agency after that – no one knew if he’d quit or got fired for sub-par creative, or for leaving Lisa to plan the funeral by herself – but I heard he showed up on the day to support her with a smattering of family members, they kept it small after all. Rumor had he went back to a career in Science. After the funeral she had planned at a lovely site in Greenwich, Connecticut, Lisa renewed her passion for tennis, met a tennis pro and was showing off her sizable engagement ring around the halls at work three weeks later. I ran into sad Mike, her ex-husband, many years later at a freelance job I was doing. He pretended not to know me but I would catch him peering around corners at me in the burgundy carpeted halls. He was still single, but had a “work wife” who he also spent most of his personal time with – a loudmouth crew cut lesbian who wore the pants in the family, did all their presenting, as well as the planning of their weekend getaways to Fire Island. I reconnected with Lenny recently, he was teaching Science at a small college, had lost his taste for controlling women - settled down with a nice girl in Connecticut where I suspect they spend quiet evenings at home, sans children, indulging in a little dirty talking while listening Prokofiev before turning in for the night.

THE DAY DIVORCE CAME TO TOWN

2010-08-29T09:17:00.000-07:00

It was around the time that Santa stopped coming to town, the day Divorce started coming around.

It started with Mrs. Blanc across the street back on Vineyard Lane. I heard my parents talking about it, they weren’t friends with the Blancs, but they knew Mr. Blanc had just up and left one day. Mrs. Blanc had a short boy haircut and a mean face, although she seemed nice, never yelling or anything. They didn’t have any kids, but had the same house we all had on the street. 4 bedrooms and 2 and a half baths, they called them. I was wondering if Mrs. Blanc was lonely in that big house all by herself and I wondered where the heck Mr. Blanc had gone to, I never saw him again. Soon though, there was a real stunner of a car parked in their turnaround. The kind I had only seen in the star magazines. It was red, with the top down, a Mustang they called it. Most of the ladies I knew in Westport had these clunky station wagons, but I’d see Mrs. Blanc hop into that red Mustang, gun it out of the driveway gravel flying everywhere, barely stopping at the stop sign at the end of our street. It looked like divorce was treating Mrs. Blanc A-O.K.

Next the Slomans moved in next door to Mrs. Blanc on Vineyard lane. My parents called them “The Slomans” but there wasn’t a daddy at their house, although there were two daughters. One of the girls. “Sarah”, looked like she could be in The Mickey Mouse Club; blond, blue eyes, very cheerful type of girl. I liked “Kathy” – she had a wicked sense of humor, particularly for an 8 year old. She had much darker skin than her sister, different hair, a wide nose, and a big bottom the likes that I had never seen on any kid at my school. News on Vineyard Lane was that Mrs. Sloman had made intercourse with a school bus driver, a black man and had Kathy a few months later. I loved black men, we had two in town, one was my pediatrician, Dr. Beasley who was the best pediatrician in town. He and his wife couldn’t buy the house they wanted, they had to have another doctor, a white man pose as the buyer so that he and Mrs. Doctor Beasley could move into the neighborhood. Then there was Mr. Rudd, the other black man in town – our librarian at Burr Farms Elementary School. He was quiet, wise, and kind. The day Dr. Martin Luther King got shot, Mr. Rudd got even more quiet, brought a television into school so we could learn all about him. Mr. Rudd barely spoke for a few days, all you could hear in the library were the sounds of the wooden chairs being pushed in and out from the tables, and the murmer of the broadcast from the small-ish TV Mr. Rudd brought from home. Mrs. Sloman’s bus driver brought the count up to three, although I didn’t really know him. I thought she exhibited good taste in gentlemen; Dr. Beasley and Mr. Rudd the librarian were both fine men, as dashing as the actor Sidney Poitier who I had seen in a movie fall in love with a pretty white lady and in another movie where he was a teacher that made bad white kids behave because he was very nice to be around and sometimes had dance parties for them right there in the gym. I wondered if Mrs. Sloman’s bus driver used similar techniques on his bus route, kids behaved so badly on the school bus, but I heard he worked at the next town over, Norwalk, were the “less fortunate” people lived, so that was that.

Next it was the Baxter’s two houses down from us on Vineyard Lane. Mrs. Baxter was very pretty, they had two sons and a lot of modern furniture. Mr. Baxter made me nervous, he would tell jokes you shouldn’t say in front of children and always smoked a cigar in the house; he reminded me of Dean Martin if he had kids and lived in Westport. Downstairs they had a room that Mr. Baxter called his office. It had a lot of framed pictures of naked ladies, and us kids were always sent to play down there. My parents told me that the naked pictures were OK, and didn’t hurt Mrs. Baxter’s feelings because it had something to do with his job. But soon enough, Mr. Baxter was suddenly gone, and in fact Mrs. Baxter’s feelings did seem to be hurt, her pretty face didn’t smile much after that. I didn’t really care where Mr. Baxter had gone off to, I figured it was someplace where they have a lot of dirty stuff and no kids. I just wondered if he took his naked lady pictures with him so Mrs. Baxter wouldn’t have to live with them. Soon after I saw men putting all her white furniture in a moving truck and drive away, she didn’t tell anyone on the street where.

What was going on here on Vineyard Lane? The Hendersons seemed OK, but they were the age of grandmas and grandpas back before they invented divorce. My mom and dad seemed OK, my mom spent a lot of time weeding, she loved weeding, it relaxed her, she said, and she wouldn’t yell at us for at least an hour afterwards. My dad spent Saturdays drinking beer with a blue ribbon on the can that he would poor into a heavy glass mug that he kept in the freezer for just these occasions. Sometimes he would let me poor it for him, showing me how to slowly flow the golden liquid along the side of the glass so you wouldn’t get too much foam on top. “Don’t tell your mother,” he’d say as he let me take one sip out of the mug, holding it for me. That was the only secret my dad kept from my mom as far as I could tell, so I figured they would stay married forever. “That’s enough,” he’d say as I’d guzzle a bit, making me feel fuzzy and tired in a good way. I was glad that he reprimanded me, I knew that my mom would agree, and it was further proof that they wouldn’t be heading down divorce lane.

My parents stayed together until the day my dad passed away. Their best friends stayed together, too; the Kails and the Wachtels. The three couples all had three kids, and we’d all head down to the beach late in the day on Saturdays after the crowds cleared out and you couldn’t get a sunburn. My mom would make baked friend chicken, and someone always had a box of Yodels. We would swim with our dads while the moms drank wine they transported to the beach in rinsed out Sanka jars.

But divorce was spreading through Westport like chicken pox. One of my mom’s best friends, Mrs. Patterson, her husband was running to catch the 5:02 to New Haven, slipped and his leg got caught underneath the train, the doors closed and the train started to ride out before anyone could do anything, taking his leg with it. He was a newspaper man, dignified and quiet because he had something called “depression”, but became even more quiet after that then hung himself up in the attic one Sunday afternoon. It wasn’t a divorce but it seemed like it, now there was just a mom in a big house with a bunch of kids. She never seemed sad, though, she turned his office into a crafts room and she would invite me over and teach me how to make decoupage, which itself was very boring but we always had some good laughs. My dance teacher, Dorian Kates was a real stunner, I was wondering how my mom could have her over for dinner with my dad there and not get jealous. Her actor husband had “run out on her” my parents would say. Dorian started to invite me over to her house a lot, I was getting older, I loved her house and tried to model my room after it; she had groovy stuff like a giant flag from England on the wall, old Indian bedspreads thumbtacked to the ceiling, and long strings of beads hanging where the doors had once been. She had a vase by her bed, I picked it up to admire it and found a fake penis inside there. She never seemed sad, I was starting to think divorce wasn’t the end of the world. The husbands would leave town, taking their naked lady pictures with them and their cigars, and the next thing you’d know there would be a crafts room, an England flag over the fireplace, or a red Mustang convertible in your driveway.

DETOX THE TOXICS

2010-08-26T10:13:00.001-07:00

I worked for a creative director that once said: “You’re only as good as the worst piece in your portfolio”.

This simple credo also applies to the people you choose to keep in your life. The least common denominator brings you down; that shit is catching! A friend of mine said he and his wife had agreed on a No Toxic People Policy. Crazy people live to make other people crazy. Anger is contagious. Rudeness begets rude. As Abe Lincoln said, “Don’t fight with pigs. You only get dirty and the pig likes it.” Don’t wrangle, don’t stoop, don’t rescue, don’t engage – in life, online, on the street where you live.

Think of it as a colon cleanse for living. Emotional vampires, psychotics, anger blisters, perpetual victims, be gone! They sniffed you out like a raw piece of meat, find out what that’s about and put that out with the rest of the trash. Take a walk, see who’s joyful and walk alongside them. That stuff is catching, too.

THE RENAISSANCE OF "DOUCHEBAG"

2010-08-23T08:27:00.001-07:00

I’ve noticed that “Douchebag” is back in vogue.

Translation: “Dickhead”, “Jerk”, or “Miscreant”. People occasionally still use “Dickhead.” “Jerk” somehow under-delivers. “Miscreant” hardly rolls off the tongue, plus most of the bridge and tunnel types that are cutting you off on the BQE while texting on their “smart phones” would hardly know it’s meaning; plus it lacks the delicious mouth-feel of “douchebag,” or the truncated, perhaps even more pleasurable to the tongue, “DOUCHE!!” Say it three times, “douche,” “Douche,” “DOUCHE!!!” See what I mean. Really languish in the “ooosh.” I’d be hard-pressed to find a more pleasurable sensation above the waist.

How do phrases come back into popular vernacular? Or “evolve” as such. What inspires the evolution of “Cool,” to “Rad,” to “Awesome,” to “Killer!,” to “It KILLS.” How you say it eclipses it's actual meaning. Saying “hip” speaks volumes that you ain’t.

In the case of “douchebag” it seems counterintuitive as actual douche bags, (bags for douching) no longer exists, at least I haven’t seen them, and I certainly haven’t heard of their use in decades. I remember some big rubber bag with a hose in my mother’s bottom drawer back in the day. Later it was replaced by products such as “Summer’s Eve”. Then there’s the never goes out of fashion bidet; the douche for women of means. But the experts say that douching is unnecessary, a little soap and water does the trick. Douche bags have gone the way of girdles, are half life in landfills, yet douchebags are popping up on turnpikes, cheap bars, and grocery store lines everywhere. Go figure. I mean, WTF!!

FAUX PURSE APOLOGY

2010-08-23T07:30:00.001-07:00

Dear Ms. Brandt,

I stole your purse.

I had to get it off of my chest, I think of you every time I use it, which is a lot.

“Stole” isn’t quite the right word, you’d left your husband a couple of months back before he and I had started dating. I noticed the cutest little bag in the closet you shared and asked him if I could borrow it; he said it was OK. But one shouldn’t take things that aren’t yours. You don’t need to read The Bible to know better than that.

I heard that you had left one day very suddenly; packed up the car quietly, said that you were leaving and were gone within the hour. The few things that you left behind I figured weren’t your favorites, or you had run out of space in the GTI.

I was wondering why you would leave that way, so suddenly and without warning, but as soon as I saw the big hole kicked in one of the closet doors in your apartment I realized you were probably just being on the safe side.

As far as the purse goes, maybe you remember it. It’s the little brown bag with the long strap with the big brass studs at each corner. I don’t think it was very expensive – it’s pleather, after all. But some of the best pleather I’ve ever seen – very leather-like in appearance. The faux bag had me fooled – so much so, I went to treat it with mink oil one day with disastrous results; the mink oil couldn’t be absorbed by the man-made material, stayed on the surface and got all over my favorite pair of jeans. I guess that’s what they call karma, ha! Regardless, I’ve gotten tons of compliments on the bag (just an aside and a testament to your good taste.)

Just so you know I intended to borrow it for just that one day, but then that turned in to the whole weekend, and then the weekend after that. I wanted to tell you, but I don’t know you – so that made it tough. The fact is – I had picked out a bag from my closet to give to you that I thought you might like. It was a Coach bag around the same size that would fulfill the same purpose – a casual small bag that’s good for quick runs to the mall, an evening out, or an afternoon brunch. I wanted to send it to you there in your country but it seemed inappropriate, more so than the initial snatching of your purse. But I felt guilty the whole way down that slippery slope to "ownership" and still have twinges today.

I always heard you were about the nicest person in the world and never said an unkind word about anyone. People like you deserve to be happy, I guess everyone does, but people like you in particular. Hope this faux leather purse apology finds you well.

I pray you’re not offended by this post (it’s from the heart) or by the fact that I stole your bag (which comes from some darker place in me). I do apologize; I took something from you that wasn’t mine and use it almost everyday – the fact that I cherish it and am showing remorse for my actions may soften any ill you may have towards me. Seeing as you supposedly don’t have any unkind words for anyone, you may have already forgiven me, who knows.

I could send the bag back : ( , or send you some money for it via PayPal if you have an account. Or you could take your choice of any of my Coach bags, I’d be happy to send you one – even if it wasn’t an equal trade. I figure I owe you big time.

Well that’s about it, Ms. Brandt. I hope you read this blogpost, I’ve noticed you visit here from time to time; I appreciate your readership. I was always impressed by your courage, envious of your benevolent nature, and clearly quite taken with your taste in accessories.

Sincerely,

Me

THE CONDOM SNIFFING DOG

2010-08-21T11:12:00.000-07:00

We had been dating for about a month, already we were having a power struggle. Yes condoms. No condoms. I knew better than to be swayed to the NO side, yet he was freshly divorced, very attentive, and said, “we’re not sleeping with anyone else”.

Shouldn’t you take a man at his word, particularly when he’s trying to have unprotected sex with you? “We’re exclusive!” It’s every girl’s dream. And most guy’s exit cue; hard to have that talk with any man over the age of 12, they find it unsavory. But my new boyfriend was the one to bring it up; did it mean he really wanted to go steady? Would he “pin” me? Give me his high school ring? Bring me to the senior prom? Or at least to Chi-Chi’s for a blooming onion and some serious hand holding?

He had told me on our second date (and after his third shot of tequila) that he was falling in love. The last guy who had told me that had an untreated deviated septum. We had a blow out after my 2nd week of sleepless nights on my sofa, while he slept like a baby in my bedroom on my 400 thread count sheets. His elephant-like emissions cut through walls and rang through every room. I yelled at him, he huffed out, leaving his Jumbo box of Breathe Right Nasal Strips by the bed as a painful reminder of our otherwise pleasant love affair – we never spoke again.

The snorer showed me that true love was possible, albeit noisy, and with my new beau it was apparently inextricably linked to unprotected sex. The road to my Happy Ending may be paved with Herpes, Chlamydia, HIV, even Syphilis was making a what's-old-is-new-again comeback, but I was pretty sure the phrase “love cures all” was coined by the CDC.

He and I were standing in my living room, he was off to a business trip, he snapped shut his briefcase after checking his blackberry, his coat was thrown on a bench in the front hall. After he held me for a moment or two sweetly, we stood chatting with one another before his car arrived to take him on his next business trip, he was on the road quite a bit for his job.

As we stood in a gaze, my little cute dog trotted proudly into the living room and dropped something between us on the hard wood floor, “plink!” It was a red condom packet. Rosie knew how to sit, how to spin around, and now she was exhibiting a talent for sniffing out condoms.

She apparently had gone through the pockets of my new boyfriend’s Burberry jacket and found the evidence and delivered it with the same dramatic effect as the black glove at the OJ trial.

The defendant stuttered with excuses, Rosie sat between us; looking at him, then at me, at him, then back at me with Wimbledon-like anticipation.

I took him at his word. Maybe the condom was left in his jacket from way back in the day before his six year marriage, I didn’t check the expiration date, he had snatched it up off the floor right quick. I wanted to be in love, I wanted to be exclusive. I didn’t want to think about the ramifications of unprotected sex. We hugged, I sent him on the road and he called me every night around 11. After a sweet exchange we’d hang up, contented; and I’d wonder to myself what time the strip bars closed in Detroit.

DELETE ALL

2010-08-20T13:37:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I celebrated my birthday with a dear friend, fine food, and the gift of pretty jewelry – yet the piece de resistance of this perfect day was methodically combing my entire blog for any content that at any time offended certain parties, and then going whoop-ass with the DELETE button. When Blogger prompted me, “Are you sure you want to delete (blogpost title here),” I clicked on “HELL YEAH” with unfaltering conviction.

In the past I’ve argued (with myself and others) with the same unfaltering conviction to defend my right to express myself and resist certain requests to remove certain blogposts. No one can tell me what I can and cannot write. If I’m adhering to the law and not using real names or other identifiers then to heck with y’all. But yesterday I had a change of heart. Actually, it had nothing to do with the heart with its warm, sentimental influences; and there was anger and hubris that I tripped on, on this journey to the DELETE button – along with some gentle (and not so gentle) guidance from friends and family. But ultimately I landed here: on the idea of what is the “right” thing to do.

What “right” means, I couldn’t tell you, it changes for all of us at any given moment, in most instances it’s defined by what just FEELS “right”. If someone objects to content that springs from their personal stories, do they have the “right” to object? Well, sure. Do I have the “right” to exploit their personal stories? There are clear-cut legal definitions you can turn to, but still, if you’ve shrouded identities with false names and switched up other identifiers, are you ethically in the clear? How about the people depicted, and their indelible right to say, “Step off of my shit!”? At the end of the day it may be simply better to adhere to one of the great tenets of all time: Mind Your Own Beeswax.

So DELETE DELETE DELETE, I hit that button 19 times last night and wiped out most of claudtalks and it felt strangely good. I purged over a year of content, and the swirl of toxicity around it – and slept better than I have in weeks. It was my birthday after all, a day that was honored not so much by what I got, but what I was willing to say “good bye” to.

ACKNOLEDGEMENTS

I would like to thank “Cal” for his patience through my hysteria and supportive gentle guidance and for coming through on my birthday, you helped pave the way. “Emily” for her firm advice in IM which lead to this final Ah-hah moment. “Kathleen” for closing the door to her office – taking the edge off with her take-no-prisoners humor and suggesting I shut down the blog and get myself a new URL - shoulda coulda woulda. “Vicky” for her free legal advice and solid no-nonsense tips on dealing with madness. “Nell” for talking me down off the ledge more than a few times, although she’ll never read this because she feels I failed to return the favor. To “Greg”, Life Coach and hardcore hunk for calling me "fearless" in my telling of these tawdry tales, along with “Eddy” who did the same (I still found you sexy in spite of (and because of) the fact that you ordered orange juice and Coke on our “dates”). My brother "Bob" who knew all along the right thing to do but I just wasn't havin' it. But most of all, I’d like to thank “Beth Fellows Dickens” for always hitting the LIKE button (at least most of the time) and being my biggest supporter; I hope I haven't let you down. And to “The Nurse” “Julie-Anne”, my sincere apologies for posting as what you would most likely call “Stupid Shit”.

THE ENGAGEMENT RING

2010-08-11T12:40:00.000-07:00

It had perfect cut and clarity: this soon to be mine 1.01 carat, F color VVS1 Emerald cut diamond.

I didn’t shop for it with my fiance, a close friend of mine had spied it while shopping for her third engagement ring upgrade at her fancy 47th Street diamond dealer, a guy who sold diamonds to celebrities for their spouses and secret girlfriends. Corey was in his usual perfectly pressed Italian custom-made suit admiring what he considered to be a very special stone. It was small compared to what he was hocking here and at his Vegas location, where 4 carat diamonds were considered “average”. The stone he was admiring was just over one carat, the cut, the beauty was exceptional, he showed my friend the small stone between his jeweler’s tweezers, she knew how to hold the jeweler’s loop, pressed against the eye, drawing the diamond back and forth until it came into focus.

I was coming back from a client meeting on the Amtrak when I got her message – I called my home phone to get my messages from the train’s platform. She had found my diamond, she said, and I should drop everything before it was sold. I called my boyfriend at his not-for-profit job, a group home manager for mentally disabled men, he had just broken up two of the men who were helping each other get off in a closet and was looking forward to five o'clock and heading into his Karate class in the city. “Get it if you want it,” I heard him shrug. He had proposed to me a week ago after a talk we had one night. His sister had gotten engaged after seeing her boyfriend for only a month. Dave and I had been together for three years, I wanted kids and a Honda Accord, it wasn’t an ultimatum, but I made my plans clear, with or without him. Dave went into the bathroom and shut the door – this is where he would go to escape in our studio apartment, to masturbate, I suspected, to talk to his mom on Sundays, and to vomit, I thought that was a possibility given our conversation and how abrupt his escape. After about 20 minutes he emerged, got down on one knee and said, “Honey, if this is what you want, than let’s just do it.” It wasn’t the proposal I’d imagined, my boyfriend from college who turned out to be gay had asked me, and had done a much better job, just like in the movies. I held my response with Dave’s resigned proposal, “I thought this is what the fuck you wanted.” I couldn’t argue that fact; we had a deal.

We went to Indiana two weeks later to share the news with his family. They were unassuming folks who lived in a house his dad had built out of bricks with his own two hands. They had a well that supplied water to the house, chickens that they used for eggs and poultry, and an impressive vegetable garden on one side of the house. Dave’s mom worked as a part time Postal employee, his Dad worked at a factory for Ford. One day, his Dad took me fishing at a bridge near their house and told me a story about a fancy girlfriend he had once, he knew it would never work and though he loved her, he sent her back on the next plane to Los Angeles and married a girl from town – Dave’s more simple mom. He seemed to adore her in spite of the fact that she wore elastic waistband pants and didn’t have the vanity to deal with a pretty impressive growth of downy facial hair where a man's beard would be. I thought his anecdote was odd, he seemed to be quite fond of me – I couldn’t believe that he would be comparing me to this fancy L.A. girlfriend who he’d banished to the left coast. But the fact was, I was having a hard time in Indiana, I would get a knock on the bathroom door if I took too long and used up too much water in the shower, having to get out before I’d had sufficient time to let my conditioner sink in. One evening I politely refused some Chinese food that had been in the ice box for over the week, saying I wasn't hungry, I was sure it had passed it’s prime – but my refusal had branded me a city slicker. And although his Dad continued to exhibit a crush on me, sitting in the dark, waiting for me to wake up and pad into the kitchen so he could prepare me a breakfast of fresh eggs from the chicken house with the mushrooms he’d unearthed from the woods behind the house. It seemed I had rekindled the spark of the fancy L.A. girlfriend, but soon I would suffer a similar fate and be sent back to the city from whence I came.

That afternoon we all squeezed into the truck and headed off to Costco, I had never been. They had giant jars of pickles and red cocktail cherries, and a counter full of diamond rings for people fixing to get married. I contemplated catching up with Dave and his parents who were now lost somewhere among the long fluorescent lit aisles. I imagined Dave was looking at the discounted electronics, eyeing a bigger TV, and I was hoping that his parents were shopping for some new food for dinner. How could I lure them to the place where the diamonds were kept? I had looked at Dave’s mom’s hand, she had a simple worn band that was now a couple sizes too small. She wasn’t much for finery, although one afternoon she had taken me into town to Macy’s where she pointed out some items she liked at their jewelry counter and more than hinted that it would be OK if I used my American Express card to honor her birthday which was only 2 and a half months away.

On the way out of Costco I pulled Dave aside and showed him the ring, his eyes glazed over but found some enthusiasm when he explained the plans for the afternoon: he would be going fishing, and I could watch some TV at home, even the color one that his parent’s kept safe in their bedroom.

“Get it if you want it,” now back in New York, Dave's words echoed in my head as I headed towards the bank, his approval rank with resentment. Dave would get onboard once he saw the stone. I withdrew the money, got to 47th street just before closing time, took one look at the diamond and fell in love. “Let me see this thing I’m buying,” Dave said with mild curiosity when I got home, he thought it was pretty but smaller than he’d imagined for the money. He wrote down the full amount I’d paid on a piece of paper that he attached to our refrigerator, went to his coffee can that doubled as his saving’s account, counted out 200 dollars in twenties and handed them over to me, wrote minus 200 dollars on the paper with the new balance underneath, switched on the TV to watch another Seinfeld episode and called Dominoes. I took the stone from its pouch, carefully unfolding the special white paper that cradled it. Now it was official, the stone made it so – but instead of making things better; it was making things worse. Dave still seem uninspired, he hadn’t withdrawn into the bathroom, but spent the rest of the evening rearranging his collection of action figures in what he deemed his corner of the apartment. A week later, I told him I wanted to break up for good.

He begged me not to, suddenly losing his interest in the back-to-back Seinfeld episodes. He dropped down on both knees, offering to buy me the top of the line European vacuum cleaner I had been eyeing at our local yuppie electronics boutique if only I would take the breakup back; the coffee can savings account had been dwindling as he marked off the seventy-five dollar payments he was making on our refrigerator tab, his offer to pony up for the pearlised vacuum cleaner broke my heart. I decided to give things another shot, I now hated that stupid diamond I had put so much stock in, and now I felt guilty about ever mentioning that fancy vacuum cleaner, it had diminished the times when Dave had chipped in with the cleaning, and swept the floor with such earnest.

Beyond his offer to gift me the glossy vacuum, Dave was willing to try anything to save our relationship – he had gotten the name of a couple’s counselor in Park Slope from a friend who’s marriage had been saved in spite of myriad infidelities. From the start it didn’t go well, she was awkward with us, apparently fairly green in the therapy field. We had heard from the woman who recommended her that she now heard that the therapist’s own marriage was precarious at best. “Mrs. McCloud” (we were not to use her first name) showed favoritism towards me, confiding in me when Dave would frequently escape to the restroom that she had a crush on me, and was looking at it in her own sessions with her shrink. Dave would sink even deeper into the old futon she had us sit on as she would berate him for choosing a career in non-profit, how did he expect to raise a family in Brooklyn Heights on such a salary! Oddly, for the first time Dave and I were on the same side of something, we fired her. I went off to Florida for a family reunion that weekend and when I came back Dave was gone. All his clothes, collectible figures, his broom – all gone. At first I thought he’d left a note on the refrigerator, but it was only the piece of paper with the scratched off coffee can payments for my engagement ring.

I ran into Dave about a year ago, I heard he had gotten married a few years back. He was alone standing next to a stroller that looked dingy, as though it had been snatched from a dumpster. His wife was inside with their infant, he wanted me to wait and see his new son. I wondered how you could put a child in that contraption; surely they could afford a new one at K-mart or Walmart, or a store like that. Dave had gone to law school, and was now an advocate for the mentally disabled, he had to be making more than in the old days when he was breaking up sexually charged trysts between the mentally disabled men in the kitchen pantry or wherever they could hide. Still, he looked happy, and I was happy for him.

I just happened to be wearing a jacket that day that Dave had given me, a Carhartt jacket like the ones construction guys wear, it was fun mixing this kind of gear with my 300 dollar boots and diamond studs from Tiffany. I took a pass on waiting for his wife and child, I thought it might be weird for her, and for me. “Nice jacket,” he called after me, as I headed back to the building where we had lived, I had since moved up to the penthouse apartment that I shared with my cute little dog.

I had the diamond reset at a fancy jeweler in Soho a few years ago, and wore it on and off for a year. The ring got a slew of compliments; the man behind the counter at Tiffany commented on the stone’s clarity and cut. But the diamond had lost its value, no matter how much it was now worth, no matter how many compliments I got. I had bought into the “Diamond Are Forever” hoax, and believed in the superior cleaning abilities of the pearlised vacuum at the fancy shop, the Honda Accord had left me at the corner, I’d lost my reverence for all those things. Still, I catch myself ogling that shiny white Italian scooter; no one changes over night. But the time has come to sell the diamond, maybe even pay Dave back the 400 bucks he paid for his part. Heck, he could buy a brand new stroller, and me, I’d have more than enough left over to buy a “better” bike.

MY FIRST JOB

2010-08-04T15:50:00.001-07:00

“Lunch is served in the conference room,” this other writer at my advertising agency "Vicky" said in her usual lackluster manner as she passed my office on the way back to hers. We were working the weekend on some creative push; would lunch be pizza, Carnegie Deli sandwiches, or maybe that upscale Chinese we’d ordered a couple of times before? This was my first job after college, free food and black sedan car service rides home after 8PM were the icing on the cake of my dream job at this agency. I was being paid to come up with creative ideas for major advertisers, working the weekend wasn’t that unusual, but I liked what I did and these perks just sweetened the deal.

I meandered towards the conference room that overlooked 3rd Avenue, I didn't want to appear to be too excited about the free food. The long room was silent, the red swivel chairs empty, the long oval table had no cardboard pizza boxes, Chinese food containers, the perfume of pastrami, onions, and lox was not in the air. I saw something there in the middle of the table: a baggie-full of white powder. This was lunch, a considerable amount of cocaine – compliments of the agency. I would have to fend for myself and get a cheeseburger downstairs. I prayed they would be open on Sundays.

It could have gone either way with Vicky, food or cocaine – she had a pretty well known eating disorder and a perpetual sniffle. I had seen blood trickle from her nostrils on more than one occasion. Her vile temper commonly manifested in shrill bouts of fowl language grounded in deep-seeded hostility towards her mild mannered husband/creative partner, “Hal”, or towards our flamboyant “straight” boss and creative director, Grant. But Vicky was highly valued at this place and paid accordingly, she and Hal had a way with writing charming jingles, these syrupy-sweet 30-second songs they would churn out for children’s cereals and toys. Vicky was the real brainchild of the married creative team. She would chain smoke behind closed doors, coming out only to fill the ladies room with the smell of vomit. A few hours later she would emerge with a charming little ditty for toddler’s toys or strained carrots. She would flatly present to Grant in his corner office while Hal stood by smiling like a serf awaiting the King’s approval. Grant would laugh and clap his hands like an excited girl at her first birthday party – but sometimes tried to put his stamp on the work by suggesting a one-word change, sending Vicky in to a tirade. “You’re a FUCKING HACK, Grant – I fuckin’ HATE you! And you, too fucking PUSSY,” being careful to include Hal, “You want a piece of shit, I don’t want any part of it – you two FUCKIN do it YOURSELVES!” With that she was out, pushing the elevator button a hundred times in a row, in perfect time to her coke induced heart rate. Hal would follow Vicky out a few moments later, after making apologies to Grant, taking the next elevator down after her – he would now have to listen to her on the long ride home to Long Island in their glossy black Mercedes. Sometimes Vicky wouldn’t come back for days, or even until the next week – and only after Grant would send her roses and a note of apology. She would bounce back into work with a shiny new attitude, but within an hour or so she would default to her usual verbal attacks towards poor Hal, who would eventually emerge from their office, saying pleasant “hello’s” to all of us as though nothing had happened, knowing full well that we’d all heard the horrid hubbub through the walls. It was just another day at my dream job, one day I went into the first stall in the ladies room, Vicky had left her signature, smeared feces on the steel grey wall.

It all started to get me down, I was having a hard time sleeping and getting to work on time. Grant had taken to leaving angry notes on my chair, “It’s 9:30 AM!! WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU????!!!!” on a violently torn off piece of art director’s paper, scrawled in angry bold black marker. He didn’t cut me the slack he cut Vicky; I had already started winning creative awards for my work, but she had the Midas touch when it came to churning out magic for their big money clients. But it wasn’t just Vicky, or the flamboyantly reactionary Grant, the whole place was topsy-turvy. My partner had a bong under his desk made out of a gallon milk jug and parts of a garden hose and had lines all laid out under his office phone. The secretaries smoked weed in the stairwell, I had been enticed once and almost got caught by one of the building’s security guards after a high-speed chase down the stairs. The following week the whole office had the day off to attend the wake of a handsome bearded thirty-something guy who worked with us ¬– his heart had given out after an all-night party he had alone in his apartment on a Tuesday night. My dad had warned me that advertising was a tough business, but I wasn’t sure he had this in mind.

One of the girls I worked with suggested I see her therapist. She was a rich girl who attended private schools, the daughter of one of the partners of the agency – an older woman way past her heyday who seemed perpetually baffled and most definitely gay; all of the partners had past advertising successes and closeted homosexuality in common.

I entered Dr. Gary’s office on 12th Street. It looked like how I imagined a shrink’s office would be. The walls were lined with leather bound books, deep comfortable couches nestled in burnt orange shag carpeting, a fresh box of tissue was within arm’s reach. I would leave our 55 minute sessions feeling better, he zeroed in on some core issues quite quickly before coming to his final diagnosis: I had a really fucked up job. He jotted down another patient’s phone number, he would tell him to expect my call. This fellow was at another agency and would see me about a new job. The next day I called and went to see him in his tiny office, a worn out Death Of A Salesman-type with grey-ish hair and skin to match. He talked slowly without looking at me, his face lit in the darkness by the lone light that hung over his small desk. I thanked him and put out feelers around the city, I was inspired to finally make a change.

Two weeks later I had an interview at one of the largest agencies in the city. I was told to take a seat by the group creative director, an openly gay man with taught shiny gel-tan skin, and black eyeliner, expertly applied. He had a framed poster of Bette Midler framed over his desk, she had always been one of my favorites, I had been told on more than one occasion that I was Bette’s mini-me. Taking a cue from Bette, I turned the creative director’s office into the gay baths, peppering the interview with well-placed sass. I was glad I had randomly chosen to wear a 1940’s style dress with platform shoes that day, I thought to myself as I walked the 12 blocks back to my job at the other place.

Grant was sitting at my desk when I came back, he was holding a pink memo he’d snatched from the receptionist intended for me, it said to call the new big agency back right away; apparently I’d gotten the job. “What the fuck is THIS,” Grant demanded, sensing his power was diminished with the impending job offer clenched his perfectly manicured hand. Vicky appeared at my door, “SHUT the fuck UP, Grant – or I will get the FUCK out of here and YOU can write this kiddie porn YOURSELF.” Grant stormed past both of us – Vicky hugged me, “congrats, kid, I hear you’re getting out of this shithole, we’ll miss ya.” Vicky smelled of cigarettes, coffee, and trace vomit, but the sentiment was real. I had gotten a lot out of this place. The harrowing screaming matches, rampant cocaine use, the overdose by a former employee, Vicky’s eating disorder spin-art displays on the ladies room walls; it all defined my first job in advertising – and made every job after it seem like a piece of cake.

THE EPIC AFTERNOON

2010-07-21T18:25:00.000-07:00

Jocelyn was about 10 years older than me. I had met her at my catering job when I was working for Martha in high school. She had told me I could drop by her house on our day off, and I did only to find her lying spread eagle on her bed, no panties and a peasant top, a fan blowing directly at her open vagina.

“Don’t get herpes, my box is on fire,” she advised me, making no adjustments for modesty’s sake.

I had met a lot of older people through my catering job, and my job at the town’s local theater where we all worked summers directing cars, handing out programs at show time, and selling candy and cokes at intermission. I got most of my high school friend’s jobs at the theater, and we had all taken to hanging out with older men, some of them 25 or older. We would find ourselves at their houses after the bars closed at 1AM. We would help them clean their marijuana by pushing it through cut squares of window screens stretched taught in wooden frames, opting out when they started to pass back and forth these special cigarettes. One of them promised me the next empty Almaden wine bottle, its womanly curves perfect for catching rainbow colored candle drippings, they were prized possessions proudly displayed on every cool older person’s coffee table that I knew.

I felt a little wrong hanging out with this older crowd, they were probably trouble, but my parents had raised me right (aside from the fact that they were blind to the fact that we were late night hub-bubbing with a bunch of barely employed grown-ups, watching them smoke dope while listening to Led Zeppilin records in their rented houses on the outskirts of town) – still all us girls had clear boundaries when it came to stuff like pot or Jack Daniels. We had much more class than that, we spent many a summer evening impersonating our parents, heading down to the beach before sundown – with a cooler full of ice, a bottle of white wine, cut up vegetables (or “crudite”, as Martha corrected me) and dip made from onion soup and sour cream. Miraculously, none of us got into any real trouble with these guys, although one of my friends made out and got felt up by one of them. I think he broke her heart until she met her high school boyfriend who she’s married to – to this day.

Still, the older set were fascinating, and I had no trouble fitting in, no trouble faking nonchalance when I met the sexy, powerful Jocelyn at my catering job – she was a heck of a lot of fun. A real tell-it-like-it-is broad, pretty face, her long thick hair cut in a shag. She had a bit of a weight problem that manifested mostly in the boob area, which served her well. She was popular with the guys, although I never actually saw one of them around during daylight hours. I’d never spent any time with her except for our 8 hour catering gigs; usually lavish weddings in Redding, or Greenwich where she would pop a Percodan on the way over to the job in Martha’s Suburban, later sneaking away with platters of jumbo shrimp during cocktail hour to be consumed back behind the garage, washing them down with the Cape Codder cocktails she would coerce the bartenders out of. I didn’t look to her as a role model, but she was entertaining in a dangerous way, I realized just how dangerous as she offered me a close up view of her blistered privates. It was a brutally hot August day, and the heat was really starting to get to me seeing Jocelyn in this position hogging all the fan’s air. I wandered out into the old turn-of-the-century house that she had rented out with some other older people and found the kitchen a room or two away. Now a safe distance from Jocelyn and her privates, I needed a glass of water – a guy, a house mate, I suspected, shuffled in, said ‘hi’ as he opened the fridge door, looked inside, and closed it – it seemed like he’d just rolled out of bed, although it was well after lunchtime. He had on a white t-shirt that was now grey-ish, and Levi’s, or Lee’s, those were the choices back then. His hair looked like Starsky, or Hutch, I don’t remember which one had the tightly curled brown hair.

“Hi, I’m Claudia,” I said, although he didn’t seem to expect an explanation as to who I was or why I was there. “Jocelyn asked me over, but she’s…. sleepy.” I didn’t know if he was aware of her current condition, the mention of her name didn’t seem to pique his interest.

“Don’t mean to be rude but I’m gonna jump on the day,” he said slamming the refrigerator door after taking one more hopeful look inside, “ever been on a motorcycle?”

He gestured with his head towards the door and I followed him out on to the gravel driveway. His motorcycle was there under a shady tree, he rolled it out on to the turn-around and said, “get on if you want, I’ll take you for a quick ride.”

I didn’t know if it was a great idea. My parents wouldn’t think so. Older guy, motorcycle, maybe it was a bad combination. Still, I had always been curious about them, these motorcycles. I had seen old-older guys on them up by the reservoir, riding around with serious looks on their faces, still you could tell they were having a great time. Jocelyn’s roommate, or whoever he was, he never told me his name, threw his leg over the bike, started it up, and head gestured again for me to take the space on the seat behind him, then pulling my arms around his waist.

Soon, we were riding down a back country road, one that I had taken a thousand times in a car usually on long Sunday drives with my Dad, but this was something different. My arms wrapped around a strange older guy’s body, gliding through turns, leaving the sweltering day behind us, giving way to a whirl of cool breezes, I looked up, a blur of vivid green leaves rushed over our heads, it was like nothing I had experienced. All too soon the motorcycle’s tires were crunching the gravel of Jocelyn’s driveway again, the adventure coming to an end as quickly as it had started.

That was the most fun I had that summer. Eclipsing those white wine spritzer parties at the beach, the baby powder sessions I had with my first boyfriend up in his room, those forbidden nights of cleaning seeds from the older boys pot and watching them “toke” their “doobs”, it just didn’t hold a candle. I never went back inside the house to say goodbye to Jocelyn that day, I don’t remember ever seeing her again. Maybe the herpes got the best of her, or Martha fired her for stealing shrimp, I didn’t care. I had gotten high for the first time in my life on the back of a motorcycle with a guy who’s name I never knew – but his bike and his Starsky and Hutch hair made that late August afternoon epic.

THE BEAU

2010-07-14T10:46:00.001-07:00

“It’s time for our ‘Naughty Nap’, “ declared my mom’s ninety-year old boyfriend after their lunch in the assisted living dining room.

I had heard that my mom had a new beau. The workers at her residence had mentioned it to my brother who kept close tabs on her. Apparently, they went to deliver this gent’s meds early one morning and discovered he had a guest, my Mother. She had been diagnosed with dementia a couple of years ago, had been recently tested and it had progressed to Alzheimer’s, it was confirmed. She still knew all of us, was joyful, but the short-term memory place in her brain showed little activity. The good news was her love life was in full force.

She introduced him to us as “Hank”. But his name was actually “Wendell”. He never corrected her. There was some other gentleman in the residence who’s name was Hank. This real Hank was hard of hearing, so the workers would use elevated tones when calling his name. “Hank! Hank!” Apparently this stuck in my Mom’s brain.

It didn’t seem to matter to “Wendell”. He was actually quite a catch. A retired Air Force pilot and Commander. Charming as heck, extremely witty, and still quite handsome at ninety. His sight had been declining at a steady rate for the last two years, no one could tell him why; at this point he could only see vague outlines of figures, he explained. It didn’t seem to slow him down. My mother introduced me as her daughter, “want to sit on my lap, little girl?” Wendell winked towards my outline with perfect comic timing.

My sister ‘n’ law commented how nice it was that she had found someone to hold, to be held by, I missed that feeling and marveled at how my mom had done it in her current state. Dizzy with logic, shower challenged, plucked from her home in La Jolla, relocated in a nice facility near my brother’s family. She knew no one, yet found love with Wendell. He told stories about his Air Force days. How he used to throw his Harley Davidson motorcycle in the plane to fly someplace wonderful for the day. He had written books, been a lecturer. He wore a crisp cotton plaid shirt, nice jeans, and a cool brass belt buckle he feigned taking off to hand over to me when I complimented him on it. The two if them now sat on a love seat, Wendell gazing at my mother with whatever eyesight remained. “Hank is very intelligent,” she said to me with a haughty tone I didn’t recognize. “And he’s extremely funny, don’t you think?” I did think! It didn’t matter than she didn’t know his name – Hank, Wendell, Captain Fantastic, it didn’t matter. I had never seen her this happy.

We took them to lunch the next day at Red Robin – me along with my brother, his wife and their two small kids. I turned to my mom, asked her if she was enjoying her lunch. She snapped at me, “Why wouldn’t I??” We were all stunned at her tone, the wind knocked out of me. My brother tried to engage her towards me, as she stared towards Wendell who sat on the other side of her working on his half of the grilled chicken sandwich they asked to share. He was doing his best to keep up with the stalled conversation.

“Claud,” my brother said slowly, “why don’t you tell mom about the really big company you’re working with, what was their name?” “Mom,” he attempted once more to gain her attention, “she was part of working on a very big website, Claud, tell mom about the website you wrote all by yourself.” Mom was patting Hank/Wendell’s thigh. I mechanically answered my brother’s prompt. Hearing my own words stung, it was useless, falling on deaf ears as she concentrated on removing the offending strings of red onion off Hank’s sandwich, placing them carefully on the edge of her plate.

We drove them the quarter mile from the restaurant back to the assisted living residence. My brother unloaded Wendell’s rolling walker from the trunk, I got out of the car to say goodbye. I would be leaving the next day; I didn’t know when I would make it back to Oregon. “Why are you getting out of the car, Claudia” my mom said nervously. “I’m just saying “goodbye, Mom”. “Oh, OK, will I see you again?” “No, I’m leaving tomorrow, I’ll call you soon.” “Oh, OK, Sweethear….” Her words trailed off as she turned towards her beau, who was standing with his hand extended towards me, waiting patiently to bid me adieu.

THE SHIFT

2010-07-02T22:29:00.000-07:00

Scooters on my left/motorcycles on my right; here in the middle, the difference between the two go beyond shifting.

Scooter folks are mellow, there’s no Jack Daniels, machismo, posturing. Still, it can be a snooty club in its own right. “It’s not a Vespa” echoes the “It’s not a Harley” of the motorcycle world. Still, scooters feel friendlier, the mechanics hidden in rounded, simple architecture. Twist n go to the grocery store, heading home with two bags on the floorboards. At a scooter block party I attended 30 somethings introduced themselves, politely offering me a beer, asking my name. Biker parties are keep to yourself or else. My scooter mechanics had become fixtures in my life, their shop a mere 3 blocks away from where I lived. I met the owner one day before I was up on two wheels, he was on his ancient Lambretta stopped at the red light. “Come by the shop,” he offered up in his English accent, “we’ll get you up and riding,” he chirped before putting off as the light turned green.

My mechanic mentors guided me through 3 scooter upgrades, made me laugh, and gave me invaluable advice including; “sorry, they don't make a scooter that goes 2000 miles an hour, you won't be happy 'til you're up on a motorcycle.”

I suspected they were right. Scooters are great, but I would find myself looking longingly at the guys who pulled away from the light on their bikes with grace, speed, and control. Yet when my mechanics steered me towards motorcycles, I felt I was being pushed from my nest. Motorcycling is a big man’s world. I had talked to guys in the neighborhood parking their bikes, mentioning I had put money down on a bike I’d get a questioning look. I had been invited to ride with other scooterists more than a few times. I couldn't see a couple of guys on Harleys asking me to meet them on a sunny Sunday afternoon. But I had bought my first motorcycle – it would be delivered in the next couple of weeks. I felt excited, scared, and completely disenfranchised. My scooter days were officially over.

Today I walked down towards the block where my scooter mechanic friends have their shop. But I was headed towards the motorcycle repair shop that was up the same block. These guys turned out vintage Moto Guzzi. BMW’s, and BSA’s. The owner was outside on the sidewalk, mid-rant about some “dick” who promised to buy a bike but had reneged. I stood at a safe distance waiting for an opening, I would need him to check out my bike upon delivery. The uncomfortable customer who was the captive audience of his spew turned into his Greek chorus. “Yeah, what a douche bag. What a dick.” This didn’t seem to pacify the agitated owner, standing in a pool of stomped out cigarette butts. I turned away from the dark motorcycle shop and walked towards the friendly blue façade of my shoe-box of a scooter shop down the block. Inside my mechanic friends stood next to deconstructed vintage steel scooters, chatting, chuckling, tinkering.

“Well, I finally took your advice and bought a motorcycle,” I announced with mixed emotion, I was going to miss these guys. “A 250??,” they joked. A 250cc is a starter motorcycle; I was treading lightly into this transition. “I predict one month,” the owner said. “Yeah, she’ll be knee draggin’ at the track by the end of August,” his lanky partner chuckled, “I can see her now all suited up standing next to a gold trophy twice her size.”

“So I guess I’ll have to find a new mechanic,” I shrugged. The two conferred through eye contact and reached consensus. “Fook,” the owner said in his Burmingham accent, “I don’t see why we can’t take care of you here Just order some different filters, that’s no big thing, is it?” Tenderness filled the shop for a moment before it was back to business. I walked back home feeling calm and excited about my new bike, motorcycle school, whatever was coming my way. It wasn't Scooters vs. Motorcycles, it would be what I would make it.

5:30 AM

2010-05-01T17:35:00.000-07:00

5:30 AM.

A cup of joe and key on the countertop next to it, the sidewalk is silent. No stroller moms, Chinese delivery food guys, the hipsters are still asleep, it’s all mine.

Hamilton Ave., streaming green lights, the sidewalks offer up vivid bouquets. The ocean is stirring close by. Exhaust fumes, 10 dollar cologne, everything bagels will be up soon.

Window shopping for mansions when I should be asleep. No one to take exception, to lure me back to bed, I can’t imagine what that person would look like, would smell like, its just 5:30 and me, we should do this again soon.

THE MISSING PERIOD

2010-04-09T22:13:00.000-07:00

It was a print ad I wrote, I don’t remember the product or the headline, the only thing that sticks in my mind was the missing period.

How glaring, I stood in my art director’s office, looking at the proof. The ad was soon to be released in magazines nationally, and it was possibly good enough to end up in my portfolio; but not like this: Initial cap., comma in the middle, zero period; such an appalling error.

But it wasn’t an error. My supervisor was miffed when I called it out to the brand team asking that it be fixed before it was released to publications, headhunters, my Grandmother, for god sakes.

He called me out in the hallway, wild west style, what the fuck did I think I was doing, alarming the whole team. "I took it off," he boasted. “It looked like shit just hangin' there under the ‘r'." "But it's incorrect," I corrected him. He remained steadfast. “I've always said, I’m not a fan of punctuation,” said the writer/supervisor, what do you say to that. “But it’s just incorrect. It’s clearly a sentence, a long one at that, initial cap, comma, then nothing, it looks like we screwed up,” I said, trying to communicate my point in a non-threatening manner with an undercurrent of you are a total jackass.

His face reddened, his voice began to shake, a crowd was gathering, it was only the young art director on the project – quiet, eyes a-bulge under her shaggy bangs – waiting to see who would throw the next punch.

He spewed irrationally, like a child, or a lawyer who was losing their case, “Well,how would YOU have it? Why settle for a period, why not go for an exclamation mark?! Hell, TWO exclamation marks, a period, and QUOTATIONS.” His head looked left and right and left again, as though there were more me’s flying in and around him like incoming fighter pilots. He continued on about the disaster I had created, how ridiculous my point about the period was – his blood pressure rising, face twitching, eyes darting, voice warbling. “Doug,” I soothed him feignedly, “calm down, it’s only a period," I walked away, acknowledging defeat.

And to this day that missing period still haunts me. It’s the one that got away.

That period represents my pride as a wordsmith, the period is the only punctuation I truly understand its proper use and placement, please – do not take that away from me. Secondly, there are few times in your life that you can claim absolute correctness about anything; a period at the end of a sentence is one of them. And when this man took away my period he took away all sense of control. It was only after that little period went missing that I realized just how big it really was.

MAN ON THE HOOK

2010-04-05T12:59:00.000-07:00

More than one person has said to me, “how do they find you?” These screwed up men with issues that make such good blog material yet such bad boyfriend material.

I always say, “they don’t find me, I find them.” It’s way to simple to blame them, blame the city you live in, or the universe. It’s you. You get what you seek, but yesterday, I swear that me or my subconscious was seeking nothing of the sort. My friend was having a lovely picnic in Red Hook. I went stag, after asking Cal who said he was too tired or something. I was crazy about Cal, he’d indicated as much to me in ways too various to mention. I wanted to go for a ride on his bike, go to flea markets, I adored spending time together, I even asked him if he wanted to go away for a few days, but in spite of the warmth he regularly bestowed upon me but he seemed to steer clear of pretty much any and all invitations. His no’s were starting to sink in as an overarching message and break my spirit, which made me mad not so much at him but at myself. So I set out for Red Hook alone, it was a good thing, you never knew who you could meet. Hope springs eternal, especially when it’s actually Spring.

He had me at “pashaw,” – it was the first word I heard come out of his mouth. I mean, who says “pashaw” other than someone with a great sense of irony, an expensive college education, and a deep appreciation for all things 1800’s. He was cute, probably late thirties. Tanned skin, longish shiny sun streaked hair, nice upper bod, perfectly weathered t-shirt, I thought I hit the motherload when he poured me a white wine and asked me to join him on the cozy slatted bench overlooking the water. I hadn’t been there four minutes.

God, he was cool. Funny, smart, used my name a lot, which I always find as an indicator of general attentiveness, either that or a tool of a confidence man. He was all things maritime; he worked on a ferry, and was working his way up to Captain. There were certifications, approval processes, these were coveted positions, and Luke was well on his way to getting promoted to the top. He was a fisherman, and told me what you could catch, what was swimming when, if they were just swimming through, mating, or here to stay for the season. He knew Buttermilk Channel like the back of his hand, and told me it’s history, complete with why they call it “Buttermilk,” the real reason, as well as the myth that most people bandied about. The real reason according to Luke involved cows being herded during low tide between Red Hook and Governor’s Island and their udders dragging low on the water and leaking thick milk into the channel. It sounded more like lore to me, but he told it with great finesse as he stared out on the water, smelling like wine, sun burnt skin and Ivory Soap.

Things were going well for Luke, up until the accident, that is. Things went downhill from there for him. The car didn’t see him or his bike, it pretty much crushed the bottom half of his body, he pointed to all the parts of him that were now cored of metal; I wondered how his penis had fared. He told me he didn’t have a dime to his name or so much as a penny in his pocket. This would have explained why my friend Sam who was throwing the picnic was looking over at me frequently with great concern the whole time I was seated next to salty Luke on the bench. Turns out Luke had just stumbled, literally, on Sam’s picnic, and was helping himself to generous portions of booze, roasted chicken, and now some of the women.

Luke went on to tell me how he was a rich kid, but was no longer speaking to his dad who was now married to some hoochie young Hispanic woman. The dad and the hoochie were raising Luke’s son, who had been plucked from Luke's ex’s apartment after she was busted dealing meth. “I hear meth is a tough one to beat,” I said, trying to sound sympathetic as I planned my escape from the bench. “It is,” Luke nodded like a wise man, “I speak from experience,” he said in unison with the voice in my head. After listening to his future plans to sue the city for 22 million dollars with his personal injury lawyer who he now considered to be his true dad, I excused myself and drunk dialed Cal who is always kind no matter what the circumstances. We both tolerate a lot from each other so I guess in some respects it's almost like being married even if the boyfriend/girlfriend didn't seem to be panning out.

So with Cal in my never-say-die heart, I travel forward into new frontiers like Red Hook, Jersey, and the other random places I fell upon this holiday weekend to get out of my neighborhood, my head, and away from damaged guys like Luke. Still, he found me. I swear, I was headed in the complete opposite direction.

THE APPROACH

2010-03-28T17:24:00.000-07:00

I was riding this weekend and found myself on a road that led directly into an entrance on to The Belt Parkway. I had not intended to enter, wasn’t prepared for what I came upon. I was speeding through a curve of this onramp, and I suddenly panicked. I had crashed once on my first scooter, you know when it’s going to happen. It’s like they describe a near death experience. Everything is in slow motion – your mind goes through a lot of different scenarios. “I hit this too fast, am I going to make it.” “I’m not supposed to break on a curve, do I goose the throttle and power through it?” “Can I go straight into the side of the exit and stop, can I break in time and pull it off safely? Shit, there’s a car coming up behind me, will it hit me if I do?” “Why is this called ‘Shore Rd. Drive’ when it’s an onramp onto a parkway, what a gyp, I thought this would take me to Shore Road, the scenic route and now it’s an accident.” This near death stream of consciousness option shuffle stretched out in the period of a half a second. I fixated on my target – the point of impact. I quickly pulsed the breaks, and managed to regain control at the outside of the turn, and accelerate out of it and made my way onto the Parkway. After cooling my flushed face with the icy winds along the water on The Belt I took the next possible exit at Fort Hamilton, another sharp turn that I was more familiar with, I took it gingerly, remembering to look through the turn as I went.

I made my way home as the crow flies, had a stiff hot cocoa, and took a moment to review what I knew to be true about riding through curves, but had forgotten mid act. I hadn’t realized I was going so fast, if I had looked ahead, I would have slowed down. Once I was in trouble I panicked, looked at my point of impact; the crash point – I fixated on it. I was looking just one step ahead, zooming in on the impending doom, visualizing that crash. Anticipating the embarrassment it will bring, the inevitability of failure. Erase that, integrate this: always look through the turn. This is the start point of flow from mind, to machinery, to destiny: look through the turn, keep your eye on the horizon – the place you want to go, the bike will naturally follow.

WHENEVER I'VE BEEN ABSOLUTELY SURE I KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON - IT TURNS OUT I WAS WRONG.

2010-03-23T21:39:00.000-07:00

My mind loves absolutes. He's perfect. She's a bitch. I'm sure of it, depending on the day, the hour, the second, then it turns on a dime. Total 180. No baby steps, grand sweeping gestures, no questions asked. This is it!! Plan accordingly. Bags packed for the honeymoon, or to flee out the back door.

I know what he's thinking. She's out to get me. Fact, Jack. Stand your position. Stake your territory. Piss on their lawn.

Turns out I'm usually wrong.

DO YOU KNOW KATI JOHNSON?

2010-03-20T18:08:00.000-07:00

There was another letter in my private mailbox on the social networking site from this freakish guy I didn’t even know that friended me awhile back. I accepted the connection, because I saw that we had a friend in common, turned out she didn’t really know him either. They had met for two minutes at some writer’s party, the very next day he found her on the site. He was contributing short novellas to her comment threads, two things came through in his writings: a deep sense of artistic self-pity, and an inordinate desire to make someone, anyone his girlfriend. After a couple of months of pounce-responding to every one of her status updates within seconds of posting, Randy hit the delete button on my friend. She had done what any sane woman would do in response to a stranger leaving paragraphs of deep thoughts where only pithy clever ones belong – she ignored him. Then one day while enjoying the calm and balance of her social networking page, she realized Randy was gone. But he resurfaced on my page.

I had taken the same ignoring tact with the guy. Randy had been pounce-responding on my status updates. If I posted, “Boy, this is one beautiful day!” He would respond, “Y’know, Claudia, I too think this is a beautiful day, isn’t it strange how we were thinking the exact thing at almost the same moment?” He was really attached to “isn’t that uncanny” responses. “We’re on the same page” paragraphs, although we’d never met. It was annoying and kind of scary. He was implying that he knew me, his responses had a certain – I’m watching you through one of your windows and I may not be able to tell you the exact color of your nightie but you sure as hell can tell I want to rifle through your panty drawer and write poetry about it – quality. After ignoring days and days of pounce-responding he ratcheted it up a bit and sent me a private letter.

The heading read: Do you know Kati Johnson? “What the fuck is this,” I thought. I didn’t know Randy Margiotti, I sure as fuck didn’t know who the fuck he was talking about. On the social networking site, people often knew friends of friends, but I knew that Randy’s friends were not really his friends. They were women that he had randomly “picked up” on the social networking site. On one of his posts he wrote: “I’d really really like to meet Janet, Barbara, Gwyneth, Jocelyn, Claudia, Rebecca, and Joan.” It was almost a third of the women on his friends list. I wondered if he actually really KNEW knew any of them.

His note read, “Do you know Kati Johnson. If so, do you know if she’s OK??” I had had it with this guy. Apparently, Kati Johnson was one of his social networking site girl”friends”. One day, she had disappeared from his list. She had no doubt been the object of his pounce-responding affections and taken the appropriate course of action. I only knew this because Randy had posted an All Caps Bulletin asking all of his girl”friends” if they knew her, and what had become of her – and of course no one did, as he had randomly picked up all these strange women that had no connection to him or to one another. Although everyone offered words of comfort, “I’m sure she’s OK, maybe she just needed a break,” stuff like that – no one had the heart to say, “Kati no doubt suspected that you are a class A stalker, and now your ‘Do you know Kati Johnson?? all caps status update elevates it to felony status.” He never got his answer, but like all good stalkers could not let it go ¬– he took his investigation underground, questioning all of us privately in our mailboxes one by one.

I wanted him to go away. But I didn’t want to de-friend him, look what had become of Kati Johnson, she was now the object of an All Caps Bulletin! Besides, if he ever figured it out that women were de-friending him in droves, it could possibly drive him to taking his life, another popular status update of his that alternated between postings of Morrissey lyrics, and other popular sad sack themes made famous by pop musicians, American playwrights, and Russian novelists. He would also sprinkle in his own personal writings designed to convince all of us ladies what great boyfriend material he would make, such as, “Love is the only thing I am good at!” It struck the perfect balance of self-congratulatory and self-pitying – it became Randy’s trademark. His “things I will never do” top hits harkened the same notes, “I will never have a one night stand, I will never have sex with anyone on the same day we meet, I will never have sexual passion without saying I love you,” this was classic Randy. His status updates, or his “desperate cries for attention” as my friend Melissa called them, always begged the response in the comment thread, “Oh, Randy, you make all other men seem like common animals,” or, “Randy, you’re so sensitive, why can’t all men be more like you!” To which he would respond with some poignant, sad sack response in a last stitch effort to keep the thread going or else he would have to hit the typewriter again, or Edith Piaf’s Saddest Hits in order to come up with more provocative status update fodder in the next 20 minutes.

Randy had become a problem, this wasn’t the first private letter I had received from the little known poet who I literally didn’t know. I wrote a blogpost about a girlfriend of an ex of mine who I had pissed off by writing a lighthearted piece around her questionable character and spelling abilities, she had told my ex that she was hell bent on dragging me into court. I joked about her threat in a status update – which caught Randy’s eye. He pounce-commented that he too had gone through the same exact experience. I was wondering if it was a trick, he was given to those “isn’t it uncanny how we’re exactly alike” comments. But he soon clarified via private mail. There had been a lawsuit over a “libelous” blogpost. “Wow,” he had me going for a second, thinking I had underestimated him, the guy had it in him to write content that went before judges. Turns out, he was the one that filed the suit towards an ex GF that was writing about him. The blogger girlfriend said that he was unbalanced, dangerous, and should be avoided. She was so clear on that point that he was provably unbalanced and to be avoided that she felt confident and within the law to use his real name! But the judge ruled otherwise and Randy won. He won one dollar. And she had to take her blogpost down. He had actually never received the dollar from her and was still holding a grudge about it. That’s the thing about unbalanced dangerous people – they hold grudges and sometimes quote Morrissey on their social networking pages.

I’ve had a gun held to my head in college, had to crazy man chase me into the woods as a teen, and never felt an ounce of fear, yet the thought of de-friending Randy Margiotti scared the crap out of me.

So I let time take it’s course, I ignored his pounce-commenting and it finally ceased. I ignored his “Do you know Kati Johnson??” email, and he finally let it and her go. I still would get his – suicide threat – depressing melting snow photography – I have never made love with a girl who’s middle name I didn’t know – status updates with great regularity, until today. Randy was nowhere in sight, and nowhere on the site. I did a search, his name did not come up on my friend’s list. I did a general search – his name had disappeared completely. He had pulled a Kati Johnson. The ultimate cry for help status update: a sudden social networking site disappearance, my friend Melissa was right. “Do you know Randy Margiotti?” “I wonder if he’s OK!” “He was such a great man, he made all men seem like dirt, I wonder if he died or killed himself.”

Now his page is gone or we’d all comment in effigy; To know Randy is to love him, too bad none of us have actually ever met him.

H-BOMB EMAIL

2010-03-20T08:29:00.000-07:00

This is the email that declares "Doom’s Day!!"
You go months and months on good behavior, heeding every bit of romantic advice culled from magazines, self help books, and life coaches. Then that thing inside me won’t be kept down; the stuff about me contained in the jar with the skull and crossbones embossed in the dark brown glass, all spilling on to paper. Let it fly, no holds barred, correctness, politeness aside, this is the cathartic finely-honed spew that changes a relationship or ends it forever. Herald the truth, or the version you’re feeling post last night’s cocktails and impending menstrual cycle, months of frustrations times I don’t give a fuck. In vino veritas, this is the email that churns and bubbles out of that place triumphantly, no wine on your breath just toast and coffee. Me at wit’s end – fed up with him but it’s really me I’m sick and tired of around all the stuff I’m "OK" with. According to this email, clearly it ain't OK today, and there you’ve said it, you’ve hit “send.” Truth-Bomb zooming through cyberspace, half a second, completing its mission to targeted Inbox, KABLOOEY!!

A LOVE LETTER TO MELISSA

2010-03-13T12:12:00.001-08:00

It was pretty much love at first site when I first saw Mel. She was in account management at the ad agency where I worked, and she showed up in my doorway to brief me on the creative assignment, all tall, thick blond streaked hair, pretty, brainiac glasses. Most of the young guys in account management had a certain earnest seriousness about them during briefs – I was one of the “creatives”, the ones that came up with the work that were considered the wild monkeys that had to be tamed. The account managers were there to rein us in, but not Mel. She was fun, had a let’s “get away with hell” glee; let’s give the creatives a ridiculously long time table in which to come up with brilliant work, wrench the money from the client’s hands, let’s do the edgy creative that wins awards and gets noticed and makes most account people piss their pants. And, heck, let’s drink in the car ride over on the way to the client meeting. Short of the car ride drinking, Mel was serious on all those fronts and I immediately liked her for it.

We were working on a campaign for The Mayor’s Commission for Domestic Violence ¬– it was an opportunity to do some award winning work and Mel was just as excited as my creative partner and I. She was our biggest fan and didn’t blink when we showed her dangerous work. One ad we proposed featured a hard-core street gang, scars, gold teeth, prison tats, the works. Mel didn’t flinch. “Will these be actual gang members, or will we cast actors,” she was already going over the logistics in her head, going on the assumption that we would push this through with Rudy Giuliani, our client. “Oh, real gang members, definitely,” I nodded. We had a range of great work to present down at City Hall. My partner and I had a great chemistry, and this kind of assignment was a dream come true. You could do great work, make a difference in people’s lives, and maybe even present work directly to The Mayor of New York City.

Presentation day came, Mel called us a big black car, she never fooled around like other account drones who would make you run around midtown in the rain in hopes of hailing a yellow cab just to save the agency a couple of bucks. She insisted on hauling the large black portfolio that was filled with huge blow-ups of the day’s work. I got tingles seeing her handle it like it was nothing, in spite of her full-on femininity, she had a chemistry of strength and capability that was verging on masculine which I found to be incredibly enticing.

Off we headed downtown to City Hall. We entered one of the impressive buildings down there, it turn out not to be the actual City Hall building, but it had marble floors, 300 foot ceilings, and a vast wide staircase with carved wooden railings on either side. We climbed and climbed until we arrived at the room where the meeting would take place. A small, youngish blond woman/serf escorted us into a small anti-chamber, the area couldn’t have been more than 12 feet wide, and 10 feet deep. She gestured towards the only piece of furniture in a room, a small office store conference room table, there was also a lonely easel to prop things up on should you require it. Before us were immense, aged, dark oak sliding doors shut tight. Together, if you laid them flat they were larger than the room where the four of us were gathered. My creative partner and I started to pull the ads from our black portfolio, as the blond serf whispered instructions to Mel, the only one of us that looked business legit. She explained that The Mayor was sitting on the other side of the massive wooden doors. We would not speak directly or present to The Mayor, or have discussions about the work after he made his decision; it would be immediate and final. We would present only to the young woman, she would then go behind the curtain to The Great Oz and relay our presentation, and we should wait for his ruling. It was different from any client meeting I had ever attended. I had chit-chatted with CEO’s of major corporations, presented to them, made funny jokes. There would be none of that down here at Giuliani’s City Hall.

So Mel did her introduction of the work, reviewing the creative brief, and handed the presentation over to us so that we could present to the unsmiling late 20-something. We had three options, all were compelling, possibly award winning; including the ad with the gang members, the insight behind it was based on research we had read: if you’re raising your child in a violent family, they might end up seeking another family: the violent street gangs of greater New York. The Mayor’s Commission For Domestic Violence was a task force that upped the city’s response to Domestic Violence complaints, enforced strict laws against offenders, and provided shelters to women and families transitioning out of violent homes. It was a great initiative, Giuliani was notoriously tough on crime, some people argued he was a fascist, but who could argue being tough on wife beaters and child abusers. Our ads would appear in subway cars and bus shelters across the city. We took the unblinking serf through the 3 ads we had – she took no notes, apparently committing our sell jobs to memory.

We stacked the three foam core mounted ads and slid them across the table to her, she took them without comment or expression, slid open one of the heavy wooden doors and slipped through the slight opening to the other side where Giuliani waited.

Not two minutes later, the heavy doors opened a crack, the woman/serf slid back through to relay The Mayor’s reaction. “Mayor Giuliani would like you to know that he thinks the work is excellent. We will move forward with these two, and although he likes it, the gang advertisement might be offensive to certain parties.” Fair enough, I thought. I wasn’t surprised about The Mayor killing the gang ad. I think I partially game up with it so I could hob-nob with fringe characters. We still had two great ads that we would be producing. Promptly excused, we made our way silently down the cold marble staircases, out into the rain, and in to the waiting black car service that miraculously was waiting for us right on time. Mel was always seamless in her execution of everything.

One week later my art director, Mel, and I were downtown, in a Chelsea photographer’s studio shooting the work. Mel and I took the opportunity to get to know each other better while I let my art director partner bond with the photographer. She had just broken up with her English finance guy boyfriend. Rather, she had caught him fucking a stripper that he now claimed was his soul mate. She emptied the apartment of her toothbrush, change of clothes, novels (for Mel was an avid reader), and left the keys on the kitchen table, but not before she trashed the place, smashing some electronic equipment to bits against the parquet floors. God, I loved this shit. I never knew a woman that pulled stuff like that, I always walked away quietly post break up, never having the balls to destroy property. Besides, I thought that only white-trash chicks pulled that crap, but Mel, in spite of the fact that she was worldly, had gone to the best private schools, didn’t hesitate to leave a trail of broken glass picture frames, food processors, and VCRs upon exiting. That same afternoon, she confided in me that her brother had been found dead by a river somewhere in Ohio, where she was raised. It was near a small bridge that he and his high school friends frequented. The details around his death were unclear. Was it suicide? Had someone pushed him? Had he stumbled and fell? Mel didn’t know. A mysterious letter had arrived at the family home, addressed to her parents, the contents of the letter kept a secret to her to this day. She was an emotionally layered female, brilliant, funny, and apparently sometimes violent. I wanted her to be my bestie.

I invited her out to my place in Brooklyn. We took the F train out from our office in midtown, I could feel a strong attraction growing on my end, it was undenaibly sexual. I remember gazing over to her in the crowded train, we were grinning at some observation only the two of us would have found funny, I was horrified that she would see my yearnings and be scared off. When you start to feel love for someone it shows on your face. I had seen that transition in the faces of boyfriends when they go from liking you to loving you deeply. I could feel that change in myself, God, I prayed, she wouldn’t notice.

We started to hang out weeknight evenings in my top floor apartment that was sparsely furnished. It was much larger than my studio apartment I left downstairs. We would set up two chairs, line candles up along the window, and gaze out on the Verrazano Bridge view before us. Mel was passionate about everything, particularly white wine, cigarettes, and blocks of cheese. She wasn’t picky – a cheap bottle of Pinot Grigio would do it, and any block of orange cheese would do. We would sit there drinking until the wine was gone, sometimes starting a second bottle, even on a school night. It was like a teenage slumber party, only with wine and a lot more cigarettes. I was really falling for her. Her deadpan sense of humor, delivering the statement that you’re not quite sure how she meant it, then punctuating it with a huge grin. Mel was awesome. When I finally saw her tiny apartment it was littered with thick dusty novels, more clothes on the floor than in the closet. She made the best roast chicken ever, and served it with a side of Stove Top Stuffing, perfectly timed to be served hot at the same time. I was a goner.
So I immediately decided to set her up with one of my male friends.

She started dating Michael, a guy from the agency I had worked with who was smart, read books, and was funny as heck. He was going through a painful divorce, and I had a feeling they would hit it off, which they did. They started spending weekends together at his house in Connecticut, which was just down the hill from the house I grew up in. The romance was in full bloom, my matchmaking skills validated once again, they made each other laugh, found each other intellectually stimulating, and were having great sex. It was all very painful to hear. Mel was now coming over to my place only one night a week, with her carry bag of cheap wine, half a block of cheese, and stories of her great weekends with Michael. Did I think it would last? What did I think of his ex-wife? Had she gone away for good? His house was so cute, they had taken a lovely ride up into the woods, they had sex on Sunday afternoons before he would take her to the train station.
Uhggg, this stuff made me jealous and sad, but like my “in love” face on the subway, she didn’t seem to notice.

We lost touch. Mel had some nutter friends that I didn’t take to. One was sort of in and out of a bad coke habit and an abusive marriage, I didn’t really roll with those sort of chicks. She and Michael had split up, she eventually left the agency, moved to California, we had lost touch.

Just last year I got a call from Mel, I was surprised that she still had my number, people change cell phones so often these days, and old friends often get edited out in the transition. We didn’t skip a beat, the chemistry was still rock solid, but my crush miraculously gone. And now we speak on the phone almost everyday, peeing ourselves with laughter as we did back in the days of wine and cheddar. We play therapist to each other, take turns listening to the quandaries du jour. We both have a penchant for diagnosing the mental health illnesses of men we’ve dated according to the NIMH (National Institute of Mental Health)’s website: Narcissist, Sociopath, Borderline Personality, Bipolar Personality 1 or 2, Abusive, or just plain selfish. We muse on where we might one day retire, me sometimes longing that it will be in the same place. Michael, the man I set her up with said we had the same exact voice on the phone, I found that interesting, like kind of a fated soul mate thing. I love Mel, I sometimes get mad at her in ways that I usually reserve only for men. It’s hard to define my feelings, it’s nowhere to be found on the NIMH website or any other. It’s not sexual, it’s more than BFF, it’s ineffable and wondrous, and I imagine it’s forever.

MORNING ON 23RD ST.

2010-03-06T09:54:00.000-08:00

It turned out to be a great Friday morning. My car had to be moved for alternate side of the street parking at 9 AM so I had some time to kill with the vehicle before 10:30. I called up Cal to see if he wanted to come over and take the stylishly cool metal cabinet and hybrid VHS/VCR he had trash-picked on his way over to our dinner date last weekend. Oh, how the man loved to trash pick, it was in his blood and he had a gift for it. I questioned the VHS/CD hybrid he had under his other arm, but the cabinet was the fashizzle. I had been sort of looking for a spot for it in my place, I knew if he came over and saw it well placed, I could probably wrench it away from him. But the heavy metal piece was still standing in the middle of my front hall with the relic tape player from The Wiz circa 80’s adding to it’s height, bulk, and presence.

Anyway, I offered to come pick up Cal at his house a few blocks away, bring him over here to fetch his prizes, load them into the car and take them back to his home filled of his worldly possessions. The man had enough to fill 3 upstate antique shops, and enough brick-a-brack to keep the old ladies who ran the church sales pricing stuff for months.

But Cal had a better plan for the morning, and it did sound like a lot more fun to me. He wanted us to go to this place on 23rd street I had heard him talk about before like a kid on Christmas morning. It was called –something- Housing Works. I guess they had all sorts of antique finds among the crap that some people call antiques, but are actually stuff from dead people’s apartments that they should have thrown out long before they were dead. Anyway, Cal had always spoken of it with much affection and was inviting me to join in the adventure. He would makes us some coffee, put it in his jumbo to-go cups, we would head in to 23rd Street, crab a space, go antiquing, and he would drop me at work downtown and bring my wheels back to Brooklyn all before 11. I always jumped at any opportunity to have an adventure with Cal. He was fun to hang out with. I loved his man-energy, he was a big man, a retired cop, and pretty much my best friend at this point. Whatever we did, it felt like some Huck Fin adventure. Cal had a certain turn of the century vibe but I couldn’t quite put my finger on why that was. He was a great storyteller, had a laid back energy of days gone by, he rarely used profanity of any kind – other than when he was quoting cops or perps – pulling another great tale from his vast vault of stories from his NYPD days.

We headed over the Brooklyn Bridge and off into the city, Cal riding shotgun, navigating our route to 23rd st, looking over his shoulder at every lane change or turn I would make en route. No harm could come to me when Cal was by my side, he made sure of it. He had called out a waiter who gave me ‘tude when I sent back my cheeseburger just last week. It was scary, protective, and provocative and made me want to jump him right there in the booth.

We grabbed a spot around 2nd Ave and 23rd. Cal picked up the Muni Meter charge, he always paid. It was just one more chivalrous quality that topped off my love for the guy. We had some time to kill before this place opened, so we meandered up the sidewalk along the wide open two way street. It was a pretty day, Cal reminded me that Spring was just 17 days away.

But soon our Spring musings were interrupted by a sketchy element near the corner of 23rd and 3rd. Right by a coffee and donut cart stood a group of colorful characters/youths. It was hard to tell if they were 16 or 25. One black kid was kind of hopping and bobbing in place, his dental health seriously in question, he was having a convo with a freshly showered girl in a baseball jacket and pajama pants. Her freshly washed hair pulled back tightly from her clean scrubbed lily-white face. They were hub-bubbing and looking around from side to side. The boy with the intermittent teeth was speaking in rushed whispered tones, she was more audible, “Yo, y’know if he’s got the Mac??” There were a cluster of other kids around them, in various states of cleanliness and aptitude. The man inside the coffee cart looked like he was crowded with business, yet no legitimate folks could dare approach him through the sketchy amoeba that blocked their way.

We crossed 3rd Avenue, Cal was looking back at them over his shoulder, “God, that pisses me off.” “What,” I said, “…they were pretty funny.” “You didn’t see that?” He said to me now standing on the opposite curb next to me, still looking towards the other corner. “We just saw two drug buys, you didn’t see that?” He went on to explain that he had seen money and drugs change hands. Twice. And it was barely 9:30, I thought to myself. It really irked him, I said, “Well, do something.” “What should I do, make a citizen’s arrest?” he said, still annoyed. It had to be a little tough, being retired and seeing stuff like this go down with such disrespect in broad daylight. He explained to me that even if you did call the cops, years ago they had changed the rules, these complaints were now logged and forwarded to the Narcotics Unit.

We crossed back over to the opposite side of street from the activity and Cal explained the ins and outs of what was probably going on across the way. There was a methadone treatment center near by. The junkies would get their meds and “sell” them usually not for cash, but for other drugs. But it was complicated. The junkies had to return their vials the following week to get more methadone, so they would have to transfer the stuff to other packaging to keep their scam going. They also had to take a blood test at the treatment center to make sure they were actually using the methadone, so they would do about a 3rd of it so they would have traces of it in their system, and sell/trade the remainder. It always amazed me how crafty drug addicts could be, if only they used their cunning for good, all of the world’s problems would be solved, that sort of thing.

No matter what we encountered in our travels, Cal knew the real story behind it. It was really remarkable. He knew everything there was to know about the Gowanus Canal, the history of The Wild West, he had a broad based knowledge of minerals, mining, and all the underpinnings of every form of crime ever committed. He couldn’t cook to save his life, but that was the only hole I could poke in what he knew. As far as I could tell he knew all there was to know about the topic. And the topic was “Everything”.

After we watched one of the young men hop in and out of a Sleepy’s mattress store that he was apparently using to stash his goods, we got tired of our civilian stake out and slipped into a Salvation Army. An authoritative employee admonished us with a startling intercom quality to her voice – “No Beverages In The Store!” busting us with our jumbo coffees that Cal had brought for us for our morning adventure. I nodded agreeably and placed my cup on the counter and waited quietly like I was in a “time out” corner. Cal ignored the woman’s warning and disappeared into the color coded racks of polyester clothing probably heading to the back of the store to where they kept the furniture. You never knew what you could find, what some antique dealer had missed, that once in a lifetime find that every thrift store aficionado hoped he would one day find, and against all odds maybe today would be that day.

We left the store and saw that the nefarious crowd had dispersed, like cockroaches skittering off when the lights come on – at least that’s what I imagined cops on the job would say in instances such as this. But Cal explained that they had actual hours of business. It seemed the 9:30 to 10 window was over, and all interested parties knew the rules, everyone was gone. Only the showered girl in the pajama bottoms and baseball jacket was still there, looking from side to side, delivering an seemingly important message to someone on the other end of her cell phone. Another girl joined her, and they moved along down the street. Cal said, “they’re probably SVA students going to class.” I had found a hole in Cal’s knowledge base. SVA was expensive, it was hard to get in to, it trained fairly well-to-do kids in all matters of taste and high design, and they would never allow a girl in plaid pajama bottoms and a Mets jacket to walk through the front doors.

Finally, our whole reason for coming to 23rd Street was opening its doors up the block. We did a quick walk around, I was hoping to find a terrific round dining table, but knew the odds were against me, gauging the other stuff that lined the linoleum floors. Cal had admitted on the way in that he was actually picking up something he had purchased on their online auction. He prepared me for what would turn out to be a very ugly lamp. Even the woman in the store who went to fetch it from the basement said, “I know just the one, it’s quite unusual”. That was code for butt ugly. When she finally brought it up I could see how he could think it would be interesting in a good way. From a distance, it looked like it was made of forged wrought iron, but it turned out to look like it had come from some Pier One impersonator store, or another store with a generic name that was big in the 90’s, like “The Lamp Store” or “All Things Lamps”. Still, he seemed mildly please, he could take it apart, put it back together, make another lesson out of it and add it to his vast knowledge base of All Things Everything.

Mission accomplished, another adventure with Cal was coming to an end. But as we left the second hand home store, 23rd Street did not disappoint. Our ears were met by the shrill tones of what sounded like a overly dramatic drag queen from “the projects.” He was wailing, lying there in the middle of the street. He had his hands cuffed behind his back, with a white cloth wrapped tightly around them. He was banging the side of his head against 23rd street, surrounded by several officers who had barricaded themselves in with 3 NYPD cruisers. They were just standing around, chuckling, taking in the spectacle, just another day at work. It was pretty funny, this guy was “sobbing” with no apparent tears. He had the bravado of bad acting – like a silent movie actress making the switch to talkies and not knowing you needed to tone it down for the new medium.
“I’z just wanna DIE!!!” “Please, juz lemme DIE-eeee (sob-sob)” Bang bang went his head, he was making sure it hit softly against the pavement. The cops standing by, apparently waiting for the cop with the super thick pair of rubber gloves. I thought they should feign some concern, a woman approached me, saying, “this is so sad”, shaking her head regretfully, apparently the man’s over-the-top performance had moved her. “I’z just wanna DIE-EEEEEE” he wailed between dry sobs.

Cal had gone across the street to empty his bladder at the Starbucks. He was crossing back over towards me, shaking his head cracking up. “You go over to this guy and offer him some Ho-Ho’s and he’ll be, “I’z wanna DIE---EEEE—gee thanks (gobble-gobble-gobble)!!” God, I loved Cal. So fucking funny, so true, the retro Ho-Ho’s reference and everything.

We left the scene and strolled back towards the car. Cal said “we better pick up the tempo if we want to miss a ticket.” I tried to keep up with him in spite of the fact that his legs were a third longer than mine, plus I was in no rush to leave him and go in to work.

He dropped me at the front door of my office, a block away from The Hudson, near the West Village. A wave of disappointment came over me. I was headed in for a day of legitimate goings on in the ad biz. The politics and drama had died down with the recession. It was pretty much heads down, do your work, keep your job. Cal leaned over and gave me a kiss, and sent me off like a kid at the school bus. I still held on to the coffee he had given me at the start of our morning adventure. I glanced over at it at various points through my tedious day – copy revisions, inner office emails, and meetings with account guys. The cardboard coffee cup was a reminder of my great morning on 23rd Street, our morning, me and Cal; the great narrator, protector, and finder of rare treasures among the trash.

ODE TO OLD BOYFRIENDS

2010-02-25T12:58:00.000-08:00

Old boyfriends remind you that someone in the world really understands what makes you tick, and still finds that stuff interesting enough to stick around.

Old boyfriends keep you honest. You cannot reinvent yourself with an old boyfriend who knows the real you. In spite of your attempts to appear more clever, more together, less insecure, they know the truth, and don’t hesitate to call you on it.

Old boyfriends sometimes have better memories of the relationship than when they left it.
Never underestimate revisionist history when it comes to your old relationship. “Never look back” is good advice, but accepting that it wasn’t all bad helps you move forward. So touch base with your old boyfriend, he’ll put a positive spin on the whole thing.

Old boyfriends sometimes want you back. Because inexplicably, they somehow feel rejected. They may have cheated on you, not returned your phone calls, but that’s all a wash. If they can’t see you naked now, it just plain hurts. This can be somewhat rewarding. Just be clear on the new terms of service. Nobody likes a cock tease. Especially an old boyfriend cock tease.

Old boyfriends hate new boyfriends. They’ll tell you to be careful, tell you that he’s only using you for sex, that they’re not spending enough quality time together out of the bedroom - all the stuff you wish someone would have told you when you were dating him.

Old boyfriends really care. They have nothing to gain. They know they’re probably not going to get any, yet they’re there, as a friend. You can bend their ear about all sorts of stuff – jobs, hobbies, hopes, fears, just don’t talk about new crushes. Conversation over.

Old boyfriends teach you what to look for in new boyfriends. We sometimes forget the good in people that we’ve dated. Spending time with an old boyfriend can remind you what you actually saw in him, and help identify what qualities to look for in your new relationships.

Old boyfriends remind you of red flags you ignored. Did he mention he was bad at relationships? Wanted to sleep with his ex-wife’s mother or sister? When you’re at a restaurant, does he do his impersonation of one of those cat clocks with the shifting eyes? These early warning signs are the reason your boyfriend became your old boyfriend. Therefore reminding you not to ignore them in your next boyfriend.

Old boyfriends, the good ones, will be there. To buy you an occasional dinner, to help you in emergencies, to support your dreams and ridiculous fantasies. And yes, to remind you that you still have a magical effect on Mr. Happy – even if he has to go home sad.

AN UNEMPLOYED DAY

2010-02-20T13:55:00.001-08:00

Make a perfect piece of toast. Paint a peace sign in raspberry jam with your finger, or draw a funny penis. Leave the crumbs, coffee cup, and crumbled napkin as a still life.

Wash your plate after 3 PM. Lukewarm water running over porcelain – this sink full of dirty dishes, a fountain to admire. Toss a penny in and wish for more days like this.

THE MAN WHO FEARED WOMEN'S TOOTHBRUSHES

2010-02-16T15:37:00.000-08:00

In line at the burrito place, waiting outside the burrito place for our order to be filled, the diner on Sunday mornings, poking around antique shops, walking down every block in a 3 mile radius of my place, the ubiquitous middle-aged single women stroll, and set their sights on my man.

Well, he’s not my man. He was once, but never for that long. There was always another middle aged single lady lying in wait – like the one that owned the ever so hip bakery in the neighborhood. He was always delivering wedding cakes for her, he said it was innocent, that they were just friends. It seemed her delivery van was always breaking down and he was the only one with the Midas touch for delivering baked goods. Pretty soon I saw his pick up truck parked in front of that bakery every time I drove by. And soon after that, I’d see her behind the wheel of his truck with no Cal in sight – me standing at the sidewalk getting a hit by a face full of exhaust – the giant a poof of finely sifted cake flour choking my lungs.

That was years ago, she ended up being with him, but everything ended abruptly when she cleared out one of his drawers to make a combo pantie/sock drawer for herself. Cal is a man who’s blood runs cold at the sight of a woman’s toothbrush, yet he used to break down doors and haul dangerous organized crime characters off to jail. Fearless against the city’s most dangerous element, testifying against violent criminals in court and returning to his home that was listed in the white pages, full address plain as day. Yet women's toiletries sent him running like a little girl to the folds of a mother’s skirt.

Oddly, this is one of the reasons why I sort of loved him. Maybe because it ensured the fact that no one woman would be around too long. Women like to roost, what’s the old joke; what do two lesbians bring to a first date? A U-Haul Truck! Women tend to be nesters, and Cal looked like he was a prime candidate. Well mannered, respectful, a good listener, a houseful of antiques and well-tended-to houseplants. It was the perfect cover, only it wasn’t a cover, it was who Cal was. And single middle-aged women fell for it every time.

He would make an old fashioned “howdy ma’am” nod to almost every woman we passed on Main Street, I would picture him whittling notches on his antique oak headboard with each gestured hello.

That was years ago, and now he couldn’t be more important in my life; I have made peace with all the other single middle aged women on the street, our burrito place, even the lady with the bakery who he still refers to as a “rock star”. I know of every woman from his past – some are still around – the one with the fucked up kid who can’t stay out of rehab, the one in social services, the one who knows how to use a circular saw, I’m good with them all, although we’ve never met.

For therein lies the secret to winning Survivor on The Lost Island of Middle-aged Broads. I understand that all these other middle-aged women are part and parcel of being Cal; I sit by his fire listening to their stories – sometimes I feel for them as though they were friends.

Why is he worth my friendship, my time, this story? He will always be that fearless cop I first fell in love who brought down the bad guys and who more often than not would leave his weapon at home because I knew he secretly believed that guns were for scaredy-cats. I love him for his antique birdhouses, his pretty glass lamps, they way he shoots off on his motorcycle as the yellow light turns red. He’s bad-ass, collects pretty seashells – I even love his fear of women's toothbrushes – it doesn’t scare me anymore.

COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS OF THE LTR ON CRAIGSLIST

2010-02-10T12:55:00.000-08:00

So, I'm poking around the LTR section of Craigslist. "LTR," that's short for long term relationship. I guess it could be misconstrued. Back in the day it meant a respectful, loving relationship between two people. But times they are a changin', this fact is never more nakedly exposed than on Craigslist.

Let's start with the guy who is a professional reader of women's nipples. He claims if you show him your nipples he can tell you everything about you, your future, and what you need to become a complete, happy person. He goes on to say in a Madison Ave-type subhead - "This stuff really works!" Did he run this claim through legal? Did this "Areola Expert" get a degree at the TTS Academy? Does nipple reading qualify as a LTR? It sounds to me like more of a short office visit. If so, will my claim get bounced back from my HMO?

Then there's the minimalist poster in the Long Term Relationship section, who shares his romantic intentions – all synthesized in one word: "FISTING!" What kind of return would one get in the men for women LTR section? Is this every straight girl's dream? Perhaps "DINNER AND A MOVIE AND FISTING" would be more fitting for this audience. I don't know. I'm sure there are some nice women who might partake in the not so gentle act of fisting. Perhaps "FISTING AND SPOONING" might be more akin to what today’s women are looking for. But that's just me. I mean, not me. I just want dinner and a movie and maybe a scoop of vanilla ice cream. I'm not much for fisting – but no judgments.

So, moving on down the list I come upon, "Shaved? Or 1970's Bush?" I appreciate a man who's open minded to blonds or brunettes, skinny or Rubenesque, long hair or short – but he's specifying the grooming habits of your pubis? He's into Brazillians, and I don't mean women who wear string bikinis who sing the bossa nova. That said, he is an equal opportunity pubis-specifier. He's also open to the Angela Davis' of venus mounds. Are these appropriate checklist entries for LTR's? I'm thinking something more like, "Are you spiritual, like puppies, and have a Afro-tastick bush so untamed that it bulges from behind your little black dress." I don't know. Pubic hair is important, men can be so specific, but should it be front and center of your want list in the LTR section? Can we please leave bald, bushy, combed or corn-rowed out of the up front criteria?

When it comes down to it, what's wrong with the good ol' date night cliches? The long walks on the beach, enjoying quiet nights by the fire, taking spontaneous weekend drives to nowhere in particular. But using my nipples as a Ouija board will never make the classics.

THE LEAKY REFRIGERATOR

2010-01-24T15:52:00.001-08:00

I have a tenant, a lovely Japanese woman with a young daughter. She is very gentile and speaks almost no English. A few months ago, she told me that her refrigerator had a leak inside. At first it was a small drip, she put a bowl under it, she was emptying it almost every day.

I had my super take a look at the leaky appliance, he said fixing it would involve new gaskets, a new compressor, it would probably cost at least $500 to repair, it simply wasn’t worth it. I told my tenant that I would have to buy a brand new one. She felt badly, she didn’t want me to have to purchase a whole new appliance, she assured me there was no rush, to take my time, for now she could keep changing the bowls of increasingly brown liquid.

I told myself I would shop for refrigerators the next week, then the week after that; then four weeks passed. I ran into my tenant in the lobby one morning, “don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten about you,” I assured her. It was true, the drip in the fridge nagged at me almost every day, yet the thought of a $700 charge on my Amex was too much to bear, I had removed the card from my wallet altogether. Still, everyday I thought, I should take a walk over to Lowe’s today, but Lowe’s would be replaced by a drive to Connecticut, a dumpling foray in Chinatown, a mental health day on the sofa.

Then at about 8:30 one morning my tenant’s number came up on my caller ID. The 20 year old refrigerator was on life support, she was standing in front of it with my super. I ran downstairs, patting myself on the back for being so responsive. The interior of the refrigerator was lukewarm at best. She had about a hundred dollars of groceries scattered across the counter, a bunch of organic steaks, other meats, specialty Japanese groceries purchased from stores far away, I offer her use of my refrigerator, it was brand new after my recent upscale renovation of my own kitchen, no expense spared. It was Friday, I assured her it would be replaced by Monday. She took both my hands and thanked me profusely.

The replacement refrigerator quest turned out to be more complicated than I initially suspected. Old faithful was over 20 years old, there were no similarly sized units on the market. My connection at PC Richards, the head of the wholesale division told me there was simply nothing like it. I called my tenant, and gave her a heads up on the quandary, assuring her that I would find a solution, but my promise for Monday would not be kept. She again thanked me profusely, she was sorry this was causing me so much bother. The search to fill the hole in the apartment downstairs continued.

I searched every appliance manufacturer dot com ad nauseam, I combed Craigslist, I searched brands only sold in Taiwan. I started to entertain every possible solution: should I remove the cabinet above the cavity? Should I renovate the entire kitchen? Should I buy a refrigerator that partially blocks the entrance to the kitchen? I was in Kitchen Paralysis, assuring myself I was doing my due diligence. Monday became Tuesday, Tuesday became Thursday, and then the phone rang again.

The docile tenant’s voice was shaky. She was calling me at work. She broke into a mindless loop of: she was too nice, she had been patient, she told me about the problem 4 months ago, she was too nice, she was too patient. The loop was gaining momentum, she couldn’t be pacified; soon she was shrieking as though witnessing an oncoming truck from the passenger seat of a minivan. She was going to dock me rent for everyday I continued to stall, she would pay me only ¾ of the rent, and for everyday after that, another $75 would be docked. Her math calculations stunningly correct in the eye of her blinding rage.

Fuck this bitch, I thought, “Fine, but then we’re done,” I told her flatly. I had extended her lease twice, indulging her odd requests for partial year leases. I was such a great person, I thought, but no more Mr. Nice Guy. I told her to be out in April – done, finito. I’ll show her, that crazy Asian Princess, who did she think she was, screaming at me like that, refusing me monies. I fixed her wagon good, she paused mid scream as I delivered the April 1 vacate, whimpering a faint “oookayyy”, the last couple “yy’s” cut off with the abrupt click of the phone slamming down on my end.

I stomped down the hall of the ad agency, looking for an office in which to vent. I found a work friend, Morissa – a cynic, a fair person, the first to jump on the “yeah, fuck ‘em” train. I breathlessly started my story of indignation, “Hey, remember that woman with the leaky refrigerator, well, it broke and NOW that bitch is” Morissa interrupted me “what? you mean you haven’t fixed it for her yet, that was four months ago.”

Walking home from the subway, I was still shaken from the unsavory exchange with the Asian Princess. I shared my story with a couple of friends when I returned home, recounting the injustice of The Princess’ attack, bragging of my fierce retributive threat to not renew her lease. My friend Mel listened well, then urged me to think about how frustrated she must be, having a young child that she was now having difficulty feeding at the end of a long day. I speed dialed Brian, my go-to guy who always took my side, now silent on the other end after I again bragged how I’d pulled the lease out from under The Bitch Princess. He waited for a pause in my tirade. “Maybe you’ll both settle down after a couple of days.” We had discussed on many occasions what a great tenant this woman was, how she was still paying top dollar rent on a now devalued apartment. I didn’t sleep very well that night. I was still clinging to my rightness, I would not be yelled at, I would not be wronged. But my tenant was right. She HAD told me four months ago. She had been nice. She had been more than patient; yet I passed Lowe’s at every occasion.

I called my super that morning and asked him to meet me and confirm final measurements, I had to buy something today, it had to be delivered tomorrow no matter what. It might mean dismantling the cupboards above – I feared the refrigerator I would be ordering would push the limits of the particleboard cabinet above. As we were leaving her apartment, my tenant was coming in, we looked at each other with regret and remorse, we clasped hands – exchanging apologies and responsibilities for the ugliness that had ensued, we were again BFT’s. Best Friends in Tenancy.

The next day the refrigerator came, my super removed it from it’s packing, it was beautiful and huge, surely it wouldn’t fit into the small space. But as we wheeled the looming stainless steel icon into the tiny space, it fit just so – with a whisper of a space to spare. I was sure it wouldn’t fit, just as I was sure that my sweet natured tenant was Satin himself, but now I realized that the leaky old fridge had been my only nemesis – and I had given it the power to destroy me.

A LITTLE PLACE CALLED "FARMVILLE"

2010-01-22T09:44:00.000-08:00

I’ve been toying with the idea of moving to Southern California, maybe having a place in Connecticut., but then I fell in love with a little place called Farmville TM.

It’s my little piece of heaven. I can skip the drive upstate, I now have property I can chill out on at the click of a mouse. The grass is very green there, I can sow seeds, grow extremely purple eggplant, visit with friends, meander by a pond. There is no more relaxing place on earth than Farmville. Between making online mortgage payments, pressing work deadlines, separating recyclables – there’s more than enough time to take a quick trip to the most vivid tripped-out acreage known to man (and a bunch of children probably under the age of 13).

The hick-trippy tracks stay with me as I drift off to sleep. I can reminisce about Farmville good times with others who have a place there. Stay invested in something meaningful – giving back to the land, hands in the soil, all this Farmville fresh air is doing my a world of good.

So think about taking up residency in Farmville, it’s a nice place to visit with friendly neighbors who share your unusually large head attached to miniscule body. After a taxing ride home on the MTA, a dose of CNN, perusing an unpaid pile o’ bills it’s the non-reality escape from reality. If they just had a good diner with decent cup o’ Joe and a good turkey club I would consider uprooting and leaving all this behind.

SAD WITHOUT GUILT

2010-01-13T08:52:00.001-08:00

I’d been down lately. And the drug companies make you feel like it’s not OK. They were pelting the airwaves with a commercial with a woman represented by a wind up doll that was slumped over with a sad face. Although some mental illness and depression probably speckles my DNA, I had always been remarkably free of depression. In my childhood pictures is a curly haired cherub with a ridiculous grin. At age 5, it morphed into a sparkling-eyed smirk. I grew up a cheery cynic. Song in my heart; pedal to the metal; tongue in my cheek. If I was having a wave of sadness it was temporary, shifted simply by forwarding to the next song on my ipod. But now, even my go-to favorites, the Naughty by Natures and Janets sounded like they were playing from a couple of rooms away, on an upstairs floor. Here in the basement, my mother had been diagnosed with Dementia this year, Christmas had come and gone without wrapping paper and ribbon, a man I was getting close to had started going down on some woman he worked with. This did not make me unusual, things could be worse, devastating – imagine all those families in Detroit. How do they do it, foreclosing on their homes, eating canned foods from the American Cross? They have their families, their churches; they have God.

There is so much good here. My dear friends, new walnut cabinets, Trader Joe’s. I’m blessed to have work, and a 27 year old that comes over to clean my kitchen and offers to cook me dinner in exchange for “some brain”; all plus column stuff. And there’s the 50 something man at work that made me feel like fucking again (with his Ray Bans and his four letter word peppered impassioned rages). There is evidence of God everywhere.

Joy is not luck, you can make it so, definitely come Spring. 5 mile walks in Westport, motorcycle school, possible intercourse ¬– who knows, even love if I will allow it. But in the meantime I reserve the right to be sad and even brag about it on my blog – like I would a boyfriend, or a ride on a Harley, anything out of your usual experience, even sadness, can be pleasurably invigorating.

THE ATTACK OF THE SOFT MEN

2009-12-08T07:47:00.000-08:00

I boarded the 1 train this morning, and found myself in the garden of soft men. Boy/men glad in skinny jeans, expensive outerwear with smart looking snaps ‘n’ buttons that went well beyond what was required to close it from the cold. One hundred and twenty dollar haircuts, book bags that went way beyond their nylon everyman counterparts made clear by the organic dyed canvas and thick expensive leather straps from which they were hewn. The Soft Men are wired to soundtracks of social events unfamiliar to me, at venues I‘ve never heard of nor would be ever allowed to enter. Sexuality ambiguous to me, these Soft Men all seem to have a disturbing glisten just above their top lips, no doubt from some exotic form of chapstick purchased at The Soft Men Specialty Shop. Expensive elfin shoes donne their slender feet, and plant parallel on the floor, knees pressed together, think: young girls attempting to hide their panties from view.

Yet another Soft Man entered the subway car, his vivid white hair swept playfully across one eye, his 9 foot striped scarf wound tightly around his impossibly thin neck - protecting his one hundred and twelve pound body from the draft of his subterranean travels. His Lurex pants hugged his branch-like thighs and twig-like shins which appeared to be in immediate danger of snapping. But the accessories took an abrupt turn for the unexpected, for attached to his right hand was a pretty young girl, his smidge more feminine doppelganger. She held on to him, expressionless, as they floated to a cozy corner of the subway car to garner warmth from each other’s painfully thin frames.

There is just no telling who the “Real Men” are. The girl he was with would make any macho man’s heart go pitter-pat, yet the man who won her heart was lovely and lithe. So what’s with my “Real Man” ideal: men that are strong, drive pick-up trucks or Harleys, men with deep commanding voices, who own tools or weapons. What would it feel like to be held by a Soft Man in his sinewy arms? Perhaps he would be better at expressing his feelings, calling when he says he will. Would he buy me little thoughtful gifts, like pretty scarves, or the bath oil version of the scent I like, and perhaps even borrow it? Chances are, I’ll never know the joy. Maybe I’ll go for a man who falls somewhere in the middle. Maybe he doesn’t own a motorcycle jacket or a weathered Carhardt , maybe he wears a freshly dry cleaned ¾ length wool coat, and carries The Times, an umbrella, some English breathe mints and a PDA. One can dream.

Would I then retire my leather, my denim, my motorcycle boots? Go back to curling my eyelashes and re-up my collection of pink and peach lip glosses. I’d have to watch my P’s and Q’s, never say “fucker”, and retire my blog. Maybe I can just be the “better half” of that odd couple, the couples you see that make no sense. Then I’d finally know the true meaning of the phrase, “You complete me!”

But in the meantime, I swim upstream in The River of The Soft Men. I can’t look away from the sheen that settles in the cleft of their top lips, I covet their fine features and wonder how they keep their figures in check. But most of all, I marvel at their incredible bravery. Everyday, they travel on the New York City subway with legions of workmen, construction hulks, policemen and fire. They own it, they work it, they make no apologies – and the ladies seem to like it.

BOY TROUBLE

2009-11-05T14:33:00.000-08:00

Lately, he had been calling me a lot to bounce ideas around about opening a restaurant. Big plans for a 25 year old – it’s just a crazy fantasy, I thought,I wondered where he would get the backing. “I saved 18 thousand dollars in the last two years,” he said, nodding. “Goodness! How’d you do that,” I was all ears. “I don’t ever pay for drugs or bitches.” “Annd it’s working!” I was impressed. Suze Orman would be hard-pressed to find as lucrative a plan as Joe’s No Pay for Drugs or Bitches Policy.

The rum was going to my head, Joe was bouncing off my terrace walls with future plans of restaurants, cohabitation, and the possibility of the two of us making a baby. It was better than being carded, I supposed it was still possible, as was getting hit by a meteor. He was fun, I was huffing his boy energy - he was built and handsome. He had come over one night a few months ago with a big bag of weed and a bottle of tequila. He was the second boy I had hung out with that rolled a Philly Blunt, a gansta style splif that I wanted no part of. He smoked the blunt, we did a couple of shots, and talked just talked until 4 in the morning. Now he was back, standing over me, his arms on the arms of my cast iron chair, enclosing me. As he moved his face towards my mouth I heard the sirens of the Pedophile Police in the distance.

I popped out of my chair, he followed me back inside to the kitchen where he proceeded to expertly clean my kitchen along with blow by blow commentary like he was broadcasting live from The Food Network in the'hood. Which dish detergent to use, the best way to load the machine, how to dry an entire night’s worth of dishes with a single sheet of paper towel, complete with the folding, unfolding of the aforesaid paper towel with the precision of an origami master. The night's entertainment continued with menu plans for future romantic dinners he would prepare for me, I was getting hungry at the thought of him cooking with all of that testosterone. “Claud, I really think it would be cool if we got married and had a baby,” he said offhandedly as he gathered his stuff to leave around 2 AM. “OK, sweetie, I’ll text you tomorrow from work.” I washed my face and brushed my grin and went to bed, what WAS he thinking, I giggled audibly there alone in bed. What was I thinking, he had moved to the top of my list of untenable would be boyfriends.

THE BOY FROM THE GOODWILL STORE

2009-09-12T15:28:00.000-07:00

I met Michael at The Goodwill Store in Allston, Mass. He worked there, behind the counter. I was a sophomore at B.U., he was in and out of high school, about 6’3”, extremely handsome, so much so I forgave him his Keith Partridge shag-doo.

I would frequent The Commonwealth Ave. location in my quest for vintage wear. At first, I was just scouting for pencil skirts and angora sweaters for myself, but pretty soon I would scour the place for anything cool and saleable. I had started a business hocking clothes to the other kids in the theater program, I was affectionately known as “Five Dollar Schwartz”. I would approach one of my fellow thespian/students and show them something that I thought would work for their collection, they would ask “how much?”
Whether it was Levi’s, a leather jacket, a vintage camisole, the answer was always the same: “um, five bucks?” The price point worked for my target audience: broke-assed college students with enough money left over from their monthly stipend – after books, basics, beer, and weed, I would take what was left. I was stylist and personal shopper to the rag-tag bunch that made up the B.U. theater department: closeted homosexuals, Jewish Princesses, borderline mental cases that presented as extraordinarily gifted. Business was good, and it was in no small part due to the help of Michael at The Goodwill Stores store.

I started to gain access to the back room of the store. The dusty goldmine where they delivered all the stuff before it was put out on the Formica tables on the main selling floor. I scored a pristine pair of 50’s lawn chairs for my living room. A brat-pack leather jacket that I rocked with a pair of authentic Ray Bans I had paid full price for to complete the look. There rest of the plethora of vintage finds found their way to the hallways at the theater school.

I knew what days the stuff would come in from The Goodwill Stores central location, and would always show up right on time. At first, Michael would be reticent to give me back room access, he would kid about how he was spoiling me, giving me first dibs on everyone’s cast offs. He would pick and choose when he would allow me behind the “red rope”. Pretty soon I would stroll in, give him a wave and a wink, and glide to the back room uninvited - to pick through the piles of gold before the public had at it.

Michael was a good honest kid, not much younger than myself, he charged me for every item I took from the store. He came from the bad side of town and you could tell, he was rough around the edges, but extremely sweet and kind. He had teen idol good looks, even without the Keith Partridge hair. Straight white teeth, blue eyes, a shy smile – he was starting to grow on me more each day. He hand delivered my set of two 50’s lawn chairs to my basement apartment 12 blocks away – both at once, one on each arm.

He put them down in my subterranean living room, and washed his hands in my tiny fluorescent lit kitchen. When he came back, he looked at me expectantly, like he was waiting for a tip, he looked smitten. I had grown up in Connecticut, I had never had anything to do with boys from the wrong side of town. There were some in my high school, they were called “The Greasers”. They smoked cigarettes and rode old motorcycles to school to cut class. My parents told me that most of their fathers had jobs driving the big trucks that collected the garbage from our street at 5 A.M. Michael was from Dorchester. I didn’t know much more about him, only that he was Irish, he didn’t like to talk about his parents much – and he was one of the 4 kids in his school who were white. A man of few words, Michael ingratiated himself to me with his generous spirit, typified by the affordable pricing of the brown paper grocery bags full of clothes that I would haul out of there. He would guess how many items were stuffed in there, like a kid guessing how many jelly beans are in the jar. Now we were standing face to face in my apartment. My roommate would be painting stage sets for hours - and here was Michael so handsome and tall with his hands freshly washed. He took a step closer and leaned down to kiss me. I could barely feel it, the kiss was so soft. I was used to more aggressive boys, I had lived in the dorm the year before, my room on the same floor where they put most of the B.U. Hockey Team. Michael was so gentle, he didn’t kiss like a boy from the wrong side of town would kiss, I imagined. Soon, we were on my bed, a mattress and box spring on the floor, lying face to face. It never escalated to full make-out steam. His tenderness crescendoed into barely audible cooing sounds that escalated into waves of urgent wimpers. I didn’t know if he was in love, or injured.

I sent him on his way back to Dorchester. I didn’t see us as a couple. He was a step up from my last boyfriend, a boy I had met in the theater department who turned out to be gay. Still, I had hopes for someone who had some sense of culture, the arts, who read beyond a 6th grade level. But I felt bad, he was nice - I went back to The Goodwill Store the next day to let him down easy. His girlfriend was there, she had been crying - he had broken things off with her, the situation clearly out of control. My sweet deal at The Goodwill Store had to come to an end. “Five Dollar Schwartz” was no more. I never went back to the back room after that, and never saw Michael from Dorchester again.

Two years later I was waiting for a rental car to be vacuumed and brought around front. My boyfriend Philip was sitting there next to me in The Budget Rental Car waiting room, we were heading out of Boston to go to The Cape for four days. He was perfect. I had met him on an Amtrak train. He looked like John Cougar Mellencamp, had graduated from Tufts. He was cool, a painter, he wore vintage bowling shirts and took me out to fancy dinners at great restaurants, and knew what wines to order. He read big books. I planned on marrying him - our trip to The Cape was merely a stop on the way there. I picked up a copy of The Boston Herald that was lying there next to me. There on the cover was a huge picture of Michael, his handsome face staring back at me in black and white. The photo looked like it had been snatched from his yearbook or possibly his Massachusetts Driver’s License. The headline read: Tragic Death of a Hero (story on page 6). Michael had walked past some boys mercilessly beating up a young man in the park. He came to the boy’s defense and tried to break things up. The gang turned their efforts on Michael and chased him on to the highway where he was struck by a car and killed instantly.

Just then our rental pulled up, Philip said, “come on, this is us”. He grabbed both of our bags, I put down the paper and picked up the maps we needed for the trip. “Is anything wrong,” Philip asked from the driver’s seat, his eyes steady on the road. “Nah, still asleep,” I said from my trance. I didn’t want to start our trip with a tale about me making out with the murdered boy who had made the cover of the morning edition. We were headed for the beach, we would be eating raw clams, 2 pound lobsters, and staying at a quaint motel with clean starched sheets. I took a napkin from the Dunkin Donuts bag on the floor and rubbed the newspaper ink from my hands.

FLYING LESSON

2009-09-07T23:07:00.000-07:00

When I was a child I had dreams that I could fly. Sometimes it would be a low hover over a grassy field, other times I would suddenly find myself at high altitudes over a metropolis. Sometimes I would dream that I would lift off the ground to barely escape danger. I would always fly at gentle speeds, no big g-force moments, no near misses of tall buildings, just a steady drift, me-powered, landing effortlessly on two feet. That exquisite feeling gone moments after I awoke.

I got on two wheels to get that feeling back again. But when I started riding something wasn’t quite working. When I got my first scooter, I would seek out the roads the crotch rockets travel. I would hear the Ninjas searing the pavement from my window - on this road that runs along the highway that has no lights or stop signs. Those first few days, I would push the little audacious scoot to it’s limit on this daredevil straightaway, feel the thrill that is one part “wheee!!” and two parts fear. I started thinking about getting a motorcycle, a sport bike, along with some comprehensive medical coverage.

Then I experienced a shift. I had doubts about my 1st scooter, but a motorcycle wasn’t the answer, so I purchased a second scooter. It felt a bit more grown up, a lot more stable, and it lead me somewhere that took my entirely by surprise: The Slow Lane.

Very quickly things went from “how fast can I push this thing”, to “how slow can I go.” The scooter felt steady, like it had everything under control. I could relax a little, sit back a bit and enjoy the show. Instead of seeking out Crotch Rocket Road, I spent more time cruising the tree canopied streets of Brooklyn Heights and Ditmas Park – sauntering down those historic lanes, lulled by the hum of the low rev of my scooter, the slow scroll of gas light landscapes became my new rush. Today, riding along the water in Red Hook, I took the long straight stretch of road at a crawl - this is when my flying dreams came back. The gentle endless glide, the body’s subtle steering of it, the cool air lapping at my face and neck.

When people talk about ne’er do well RPM junkies who leave coffin lids fluttering in their wake they say, “he was really flying!!” But they’ve got it all wrong. It’s when you back off the gas, coax that throttle ever so gently, that’s where the wings are.

THE BIRTHDAY WISH

2009-08-25T09:14:00.001-07:00

He squatted down next to my chair and got his face very close to mine. The intense eye contact was overkill, given that he was simply taking my order for a glass of pinot gris and pulled pork. It was my birthday, he bought me a piece of key lime pie with a candle in it, and took a bite of it using my fork. As we were leaving he handed me his number on the back of a waiter’s check. His name was Shawnee Cloud. He was raised by hippies somewhere in California. He was 27. He was my second 27 year old in a week to ask me out. My friend Lynda told me I was her hero. She had been out with me before and seen two very young guys hand over their digits, once at the hardware store, then later at dinner, and now this. So why am I so discouraged.

I just want a boy my age to play with. A cool middle-aged guy who still has some life in him. Who’s not weighed down with all the crap that’s happened to him, like an ex-wife, cardiovascular disease, or his inability to make successful art.

Where are the good middle-aged guys? Are they with all the 27 year old girls that the 27 year old guys aren’t dating? Are they all married? I know of couple of them in my neighborhood, the ones that never seem to date anyone. I never see them with new platinum bands on their left hand ring fingers, or women with unwashed hair on a Sunday morning at the diner, or even a half a smile on their face. Have they given up on love? Sex? Holding hands? Do they watch the Playboy channel, or order “Girls Gone Wild” on VHS? Or is the History Channel their porn?

I haven’t given up, Lord knows I should at least give it a rest. Most of my single friends have resigned themselves to the fact that men are, well, “difficult”. They don’t spend a lot of time focusing on them. Me, I like dating. I am enticed by all its inherent bumps in the road. I’ve dated commitment-phobes, sociopaths, fringe criminals, and psych ward detainees; they’ve all lost their luster. I know that “normal” doesn’t exist, we’re all somewhere on the curve of “crazy”. But are there some reasonably sane men out there that are actually trying to have sustainable intimate relationships with women? Would I know what to do with them? Is there a stable man that could keep my attention? Do middle-aged single people ever hook up and live happily ever after? I saw one couple in an Eharmony commercial. Where do the all meet? In church? At The Learning Center? At a BDSM mixer?

I went out for my birthday, wondering what this year would hold. Would I meet a guy who would capture my heart? My imagination? And also pull at my vagina strings? I blew out my candle on my Key Lime pie and made a wish. 15 minutes later I got the number from the 27 year old raised by hippies. It’s still sitting on my dresser, crumpled up, I took it out of my jeans pocket along with some loose change. I haven’t thrown it out yet, but I haven’t called. It actually says “text me”. A nice middle-aged guy would have said “call me.” More likely he would have said, “why bother” to himself, and gone home and watched The History Channel. All I need is one middle-aged man with the balls of a 27 year old. Big Pharma, are you listening?