RIDING THE TAIL OF NOV YORK

It was a beige canvas of regulars at the great table we all sat at in my corner bar restaurant, a klieg light of blondness drew my eye. He was 25, startlingly handsome, teeth so white your retnas narrow, the blond hair, the color you usually only see on 3 year old girls. I sat down at the table at the other end from him, everyone else burlap next to this kid. “Hey!” he called down to me. I couldn’t believe it took all of 15 seconds, “That’s Stephen Sprouse.” It took me a moment, I wanted to ride his comment slowly, it took a while to gel. “Your bag!” Oh, yeah, I paid a premium for my tiny Louis Vuitton bag, it was a special edition, The Graffiti Collection, by Stephen Sprouse. This kid had a tough street cadence, an awareness of fashion, apparently, with a voice packing a boom and surprising confidence for a kid his age. He popped up, and scraped his chair loudly across the floor, shoving it into mine. “Hi!” he said smiling, he was all teeth, I didn’t think he moved his lips. He knew he charged me, his face about an inch and a half away from mine. I jerlked my head back with the audacity of it, like he had pulled out his stiff cock. I ordered a glass of wine, he sucked down the rest of his Budweiser, and called out loudly for another. But what was up with the Stephen Sprouse comment, my gaydar wasn’t anywhere near even a low hum. Eddie was a renowned graffiti artist, a “tagger”, as they’re known. It’s an outlaw lifestyle that takes them into the streets, down into subway tunnels, and way up high on the sides of tall buildings. Cops hunt them but rarely catch them; Eddie had only been arrested twice. If it weren’t for my Louis Vuitton Graffiti bag, I’m not sure I would have had an entre into Eddie’s world.

The kid was intense. He had the laugh of a man much older and larger, it made me want to spend a lot of time around him. He asked me if I wanted to get out of there, the beers were too expensive. He grabbed his satchel, It was bulky and weighed down with what I didn’t know, perhaps a human head. I followed him out and down the sidewalk. He said, “wait right here,” like Peter Pan, and ducked into the bodega, and came out with a sixpack of Bud. “Your place is right here, right?” It was. The kid didn’t scare me, he was a good friend of the bar’s owner, I unlocked the door to my apartment. He strode out on to my terrace, uninvited, like the moon was calling. He threw down the six and his bag, paused Zen-fully, raised his arms, inhaled and cried, “FUCK YOU BROOKLYN!!!” It was stunning and scary. He had only been here for 4 minutes. He popped two beers, pounded one, and started the other. We sat cross-legged on the floor of my terrace, he pulled out some of the mystery bulk from his satchel: Kierkegaard, Proust, various notebooks. It seemed that Eddie was a scholar of sorts, and an author. He had written a novel, a book about himself, a more mystical rendition about his life of tagging, the under-worldliness of it, the bigotry against the art form, cops vs. black people (he fancied himself one), evil as good, he outlined the major themes as he downed the six pack. I wanted to read the book, I was damn curious, but he only had two copies to his name, and he made it clear that he never loaned them out. He said that I could have the next printing, I wasn’t sure where they were printed, in his abusive father’s basement, or if he would even live long enough to throw me one, he felt like he might have an expiration date. After his tumultuous confession, the dark blond child stretched out on his back on the pavement tiles, and fell into a deep snore.

I woke up in the morning, he was still out, empty beer cans, notebooks and Kierkegaard keeping watch. “Eddie,” I said after taking a minute to take in his raw beauty. His eyes opened first, his grin flashed a half second after, a virtual “good morning”. Then he spoke from his back: “Claudia. What should we do today.” Where do you take a kid that’s been arrested and taken to Rikers, fought rats for real estate in dark subway tunnels, fucked strippers in back rooms of seedy clubs in Queens? Westport, Connecticut, my hometown on The New England Sound. He’s never seen anything like that in his life.

We sped out in my car around 11, it was a perfect summer day. The car was wide open, windows and sunroof rolled down and back. Eddie was fucking with the radio between being ecstatic, but suddenly yelled, “Here! Turn here. Wanna show you something.” He said it almost as the exit was gone. I swerved, and made it, speeding on, all curious along this unfamiliar stretch of highway. I looked at him, he said, “keep going,” eyes straight ahead, “There! There! That’s me!!” To my right was a huge brick apartment building. The side that faced the road was completely overtaken by Eddie’s vengeful passionate scrawl. It was a Spiderman feat, this renegade installation. It was signed, NOV YORK. “That’s me,” he said seriously, “Nov York.”

Our car sauntered into the quaint beach area in my home town about an hour later. Couples from McMansions were strolling. Wall Street men in expensive sneakers were de-stressing. Dad’s were teaching their kids to ride bikes and rollerblade. Eddie and I emerged from my shiny silver vehicle, I had grown up on this planet, Eddie looked as though he was contemplating taking it over. Pulling his white BVD undershirt over his head, my breath was taken away; he had a huge crass black X tattoo over his heart. It had no finesse, it was stark and pained, it looked as though he had taken a black pen, and repeatedly scratched at his pristine young flesh, until the death X was complete. “This is for my girl. She fucked my friend, and destroyed me.” He looked at me gravely, then broke out into that blinding grin. He didn’t seem the type for prolonged strolls, or collecting seashells, so we reloaded the car, and headed to the local Mexican restaurant.

The nice guy waiter in a polo shirt and Dockers seated us out on the patio. Pink cascading flowers hung from pots over our picnic table. We ordered two margaritas, no salt, the waiter asked Eddie for his I.D. Eddie pulled out his wallet, a rubber band securing a huge wad of cards, none of them plastic. He pulled his I.D. out from the sticky collection, and showed it to the waiter. It was blood stained, a reddish brown amoeba covered the state document, Eddie’s grin on it, a further ‘fuck you’ to the waiter. “That’s OK,” the waiter said, not handling it. “I’ll be right back with your drinks.”

We headed back to the city, Lauren Hill filled the car, Eddie had the seat back all the way in the reclining position. Connecticut had treated us well. Eddie smoked a Philly Blunt, a cigar dismantled, and re-rolled with some of the tobacco and weed, more Marlboros in its wake. He let the CD play without interruption. It had been a great day.

He didn’t go home again that night. I didn’t know what he was avoiding. His drunk daddy, the smell of old frying, all reminders of his less epic days. He fell asleep on the couch, serene and two days un-showered. The intoxicating perfume of young boy filled my 38 year old head. I went to sleep in my room, exhausted and content from the whirlwind of my new friend.

I woke up early, walked out into my living room but Eddie was gone. There, on the coffee table was a book, a copy of Nov York. On the inside of the cover he had scrolled, “To the sexy lady that held me for a couple of days. NOV” His signature, identical to the one tagged on the side of the brick building we had sped by in the Bronx.

HAPPY ENDINGS

Relationship bibles will lay down the law on how to find one. Complete with rules, regulations, red flags, a complete system on how to lock down that ineffable thing called “love”. But I have evidence to the contrary. Here are a couple of love stories that didn’t begin by tripping down a primrose path.


Emily met Mark in a Prozac chat room. Emily, was a 30 something, too-intelligent-for her-own-mental-health woman, distraught, she sought help and was prescribed Prozac. She had a growing concern with the medication’s side effects and looked for knowledge and support in a Prozac chat room. That’s where she met Mark, a highly IQ’d combo of irony and wit that made her feel more alive than any FDA regulated drug. Emily lived in Brooklyn, Mark lived in a cold remote corner of Canada. What’s more, their distance in age would be eyebrow raising to some. The 15 year younger Mark flew in to see Emily for a face-to-face chat. She picked him up at the airport and brought him back to her apartment. He never left. Soon after, they wedded their kindred psychological issues under a hoopa, joining hearts and other body parts, thus making a baby. 10 years later, they are together, raising an exceptional child who is joyful and bright beyond his years. Although he has inherited some quirks from both parents, as Emily likes to say, “he’s a happy kid.” Emily and Mark’s marriage is still challenged by some of the issues that they came to the chat room with, yet their relationship is infused with a strong dose of humor, the stuff that brought them together back in the good old Prozac days.

Jen was a gifted writer and abominable waitress. Her dual pursuits were fueled on a steady diet of red wine and Makers Mark. Her cocaine dealer had hours that rivaled Dominos, with the same 30 minute delivery guarantee. She lived in a refrigerator-less 250 square foot apartment, writing in squalor until the sun came up, or right up until her brunch shift where she would make just enough to re-up her creative fueling expenses. A long-haired good looking bar owner caught her eye. His zero percent body fat body resonated with her, her frame just hovering around the 100 lb. mark. They bonded over 4 AM drunken fuck fests. Their 3AM ‘dinner dates’ consisted of emptying bottles of whiskey, cartons of cigarettes, and multiple 50 bags of cocaine. Jen got knocked up, and several months later gave birth to a healthy baby boy. She moved into Mark’s upscale building with no ring on her finger, not a single “I love you” whispered in her ear – sending Mark’s friends into a tailspin of horror and a new allegiance to latex condoms. Years later, Jen and Mark are cocaine free, have a new baby girl to complete the matching set of pretty children, and have recently moved into the brownstone that Mark completed lovingly renovated for his now picture perfect family. They are not married, but swear that they are hopelessly in love. And although Jen doesn’t bond with the Bugaboo baby carriage status moms, she could almost pass as one. Until she opens her mouth, I am happy to report that she has the same wry annoyed take on life, all without the aid of drugs and alcohol.

These are stories, not my version of a “How To” book, because there is no “How To”. Love can flutter in like a dove carrying a sweet note on scented paper. Or careening in, car out of control, love rising off of the wreckage, like the smell of spilled gasoline. So capture that dove in a gilded cage, or shoot him dead with a shotgun. Either way, the story could end on a happy note.

IS SEX THE GLUE

My mother went to see Deepak Chopra speak in San Diego. He posed a question to the audience, which she imparted to me: Which couple do you think is more likely to survive long term. A) The couple with many shared interests? –or- B) The couple with strong sexual compatibility? I was surprised. Deepak claimed that the answer was “B”.

You hear all the time that the sex goes. It’s a tool that biology puts in place to bring couples together, six months to a year later, the media picks up the slack with TV shows that will keep you nestled together on the sofa, genitalia safely tucked away behind bathrobes, boxers, and flannel PJs.

Is this why divorce is so common? They say that financial concerns are a major threat. Or “growing apart” is a common issue. But is “growing apart” just code for the cock not growing, and coming away from the vagina? Is it a case of which came first? Does the emotional dynamic grow feeble, causing the sexual connection to wither and die? Or does sex take the lead, causing frustration, resentment, and the non-literal bond to go flaccid?

If the sex goes first, could it simply be the case that you were never really sexually compatible in the first place? Is one partner more sexual than the other? Was the other partner feigning sexual interest to appear more compatible, or using it as commerce? Is one partner more edgy than the other? Hiding their desire to share leather, or porn, or their desire to wear women’s undergarments? In the beginning, we all put forward our “ideal selves”. Unfortunately, there is nothing ideal about creating yourself in the image of what you believe your partner will ‘buy’. If your partner does not except you in your leather, your handcuffs, your very specific undergarments, your secret desires will be kept secret. And if there is one secret you should never keep from a partner, I believe it is your sexual truth.

I have spent entire relationships lying. Not about where I’ve been, or who I’m with, but about what turns me on. I was ashamed about my sexual truth, and thought it was business best kept between my hand and pussy. I thought that sex didn’t matter. I put sex last on my list of ‘must haves’. Truthfully, it didn’t even make the list. I thought that sex, dirty sex, was a fantasy in every sense of the word. Predictably, those relationships ended. I’d look back and say that the sex sucked. But how can you look back in regret over a failed sexual connection, when it was nowhere on your wish list in the first place. Maybe along the way you meet people who awaken that side of you, or you speak to a friend that has a rich sexual bond within a seasoned relationship, and suddenly you take stock. Now, I know better. I long for a dynamic, open, mutually expressive sexual connection. It’s not everything, but it tops the list. Communication is King, and I love it not only sitting across from each another at the kitchen table, but on the kitchen floor, on crumpled sweaty sheets, or outside my terrace doors.

Yet, I still question Deepak. I’m not sure that I trust my prioritization of sex in meaningful relationships. Am I still at heart rather Victorian? Do I have my Russian friend, Katya in my ear? Who burned up the last six months of her single hood with deliciously filthy hijinx, only to finally choose and become engaged to a warm, honest, wonderful man that she rarely has sex with? She insists to me that sex is sport. And it certainly can be, and a great sexual connection is certainly no indication of love. And lust can feel like love. How do you sort it out and know when to promote lust to love? Is it a shared love for theater, that you laugh at the same jokes? Is it simply similar toppings on your pizza? And what if you took sex off the table, could you separate it out, and see what love remains? Can the soul survive on Chinese food or Italian, or ethics, or shared values? Deepak would say ‘no’.

So I’m confused. I don’t know exactly what I need. Must my man share my love for great Mexican food? Is it imperative that he drive fast? I know he must be kind, and do his best to be giving, and like dogs, and trees, and open communication. But one thing's for sure: he must like sex, like it more than once a week, and he must like it dirty, and intense, and sometimes sweet. I guess the question isn’t ‘what is the glue’. It’s who’s holding yours.

A PERSONAL RESPONSE

I got a response to a personal ad I had posted one day. It was the best response I had ever received. It was funny, personal, moving, and beautifully written, with details pertaining to what I had said in my post, not a form letter. It probably took close to an hour to compose; it was everything I could hope for in a response. And it was from my ex-boyfriend.

I sat frozen in front of my computer monitor. We hadn’t spoken in over two years. Things had ended abruptly back then. I was hanging out in his living room one afternoon – he was in the next room, in the bedroom, on his computer. I reached for a magazine. It had a mailing address sticker on it – the name was Sarah, his old girlfriend. I confronted him in the other room, asked him why it was there, she worked in the ‘hood, had needed a place to crash one night during a snowstorm last week, that she had slept on the couch. I remembered the night, I had been sick, he had come over to bring me dinner, we spoke on the phone later, but I didn’t know that she was in the next room – he had kept it a secret. I tried to remain calm, with my best game face on, delivered what I thought was a rational speech about protecting what we had from harm, was he willing to do that, or did he want to break up here and now. He asked if he could think about it, that he would call me later. I never heard from him that night, 8PM, 8:30, 9:30, 10PM, nothing. I knew that it was over. I finally gave in and called him, he whispered that things weren’t working, and that was it. The next few weeks were painful. I was really touched by this man. He was extremely bright, sensitive, had a fascinating personal history, one juicy enough to be recounted by his writer sister in a novel that ended up on The New York Times bestseller list. He had amazing listening skills, a keen sense of what made me tick, he had a whole house in Brooklyn that he was lovingly restoring. He collected cool antiques as I did, tended to a beautiful garden, rode a motorcycle, and had a cool daughter. When I first met him he was a super cop, a Sergeant for an undercover organized crime unit in NYC. He used to call me from the surveillance van, telling me he was on a coke buy, and did I need anything for the weekend, with a wink. He was hysterical, wry, and sensitive. And he went down on me with incredible expertise, so much so that I found my mind flashing back to the memory of it every time my hand found my clit. Since putting his 20 in with the NYPD, he had retired, he was now a big guy at Habitat For Humanity, and was being considered for a position to tour the country with Jimmy Carter, everything Brian touched turned to gold. And he was my man. I went to visit him on a Habitat project on site one day in Queens. We had lunch at a Jamaican place, for dessert I sucked his cock in a Home Depot parking lot. Things were really good.

Now it was two years later, his letter now in front of me. He hadn’t realized that the personal ad he had responded to was mine. I hadn’t attempted to contact him those two whole years. If someone leaves you, you leave it alone. You move on. But this was a strange turn of events, receiving his letter. It was ironic; this is the way we met in the first place. Online, with a devastatingly terrific letter from him, followed by more I-could-love-this-man correspondence, and then the unlikely turn of events, that the online connection follows you on to the phone, and then into reality. And now, another deft letter was engaging me, however unintended for me, but it was an opportunity to reopen that door. Did I want that? What did I want to be behind that door? Did I want to say a simple hello? Embark in a friendship? Engage in a possible quick sexual encounter? Or perhaps revisit our romantic past. One thing was for sure: I was going to reply. And I did, with a picture of myself, a close up of my hips clad in pink satin bikini panties accompanied by the line, “hello, it’s me.” I knew he would recognize me. He had seen me in a lot of pink panties – my pale skin and perfect belly button would clench the deal. He sent me back an enthusiastic receipt of panty picture, which I responded to with another visual, and the line, “you haven’t seen me in awhile”. Two days later I received a Happy Valentine’s Day email, a day that had gone without card or comment when we had been dating. We discussed whether or not we should get together, would it be too complicated, would it draw us back into bed, what would be the caveats. At the same time I started to date a man that I had met a few months ago, that had been married, but was now separated. It was a passionate affair, filled with drama, great sex, and plenty of heartache. Brian became my safe haven. The man I could sit quietly by while he worked on his house, or tended to his garden. He would offer to talk through the drama of the man that I was seeing, or simply buy me breakfast at the diner we used to frequent after slow, intense sex. No matter what we were talking about, my relationship, his dating life, our shared love for making things, his new career as an English teacher, the bond was becoming rich. We were closer than we’d ever been before, and we were not having sex. On the one hand, I was having an intense sexual relationship with one man who offered me complete emotional disarray, and a moving, substantive bond with another, who respectfully never laid a hand on me. I wondered if we moved our relationship into the bedroom, his tongue between my legs, would the deep friendship dissolve with each orgasm? Was it worth taking that chance?

When I placed that personal ad that day I heard from Brian, it was my hope to find the one man who I can have it all with. Still, of all the responses I received that day, the only one I answered was the one from my past. I still suspect that one man exists, and I suspect I haven’t met him yet. He's not the one I've been sleeping with, or the one I've been sharing with. Hopefully he's the one that's right around the corner.

THE MYSTERY OF THE NAKED LADIES

When I was around 12, I think, we moved into my parent’s friend’s house. They were vacationing, and we needed a place to stay while our new house was being completed.

It was a charming home, with lots of character. There was a back room of the house, with great big windows and beautiful built in bookshelves. One whole section had perfectly lined up magazines. They were Playboy magazines: an entire collection, years of them, in chronological order, not a month missing. I couldn’t believe the treasure chest before me.

I started by just looking at the covers. I would take an issue out, one at a time, and mark the space by sliding a #2 pencil in the slot. I’d take a gander at the girl, get all warm down there, and replace it to the spot that the pencil had kept warm. One by one, I went through all of them. I couldn’t believe their huge beautiful bosoms. That’s what my mom always called them, bosoms. And back in the day they weren’t breasts, they were bosoms. Round, torpedo-esque, natural full bosoms. It took me a couple of days to get through them. I had to make sure the coast was clear, no mom, no dad, no siblings. But once I got through all the covers, I wanted to get inside.

I started to fake sick to my mom so I could stay home from school, be at home alone, for hours to pour through the pages of The Complete Works of Playboy. At first, I still employed the pencil placeholder technology, but as I got more intoxicated with all the breasts and mysterious big fuzzy bushes, I started to get sloppy. Before I knew it, I was on the floor surrounded by open magazines. So many pretty ladies, on horses, in bubble baths, on tree swings. There were little cartoons of them, too. I didn’t understand what made them funny, like Archie, or Betty and Veronica, but I didn’t care. The cartoons were sexy, too. The centerfolds were almost life size, they almost scared me, but they had stories on the back, so you could get to know a little more about the lady, I started to wonder which ones I had shared interests with. They all liked the beach, I lived in a beach town, so there was that. Beyond that, there wasn’t much common ground. None of them mentioned candle making, or jump rope, but it didn’t matter, I wanted them all to be my friends.

I started to develop preferences. There were so many blonds, a couple of red heads, but I liked the brunettes. They seemed darker, sexier, with more prominent nipples, which I liked. I was getting “sick” about twice a week, and had ample time to go through every issue page by page, lady by lady, but now I wanted more. I went to the kitchen to get the scissors, and I started to snip.

I knew that the collection was precious, so I was very careful to cut out my favorite ladies just so. I would make a straight line from the edge of the page, and meticulously cut around the edge of each photo, until I freed my favorite girl, and added her to my pile of favorite naked lady friends. I’m not sure how I picked them, it may have been hair color, or the curve of their bellies, or that “just so” bush. But I knew ‘em when I saw ‘em, and I cut them all out. After which I would carefully return the magazine to its proper spot.

Our new house on Fieldcrest Rd. was completed soon thereafter. We left that house, and all the naked ladies, save for the ones that I had safely stored in my suitcase. I never heard a word about the surgery I had performed on my parent’s friend’s Playboy Magazine collection. After a few months, I knew I was in the clear. But just to be safe I knew that I had to hide the evidence. I took one last look at all the creamy, soft focused Playboy ladies, folded them in half in manageable piles, and tucked them between the rocks of the 200 year old stone wall behind our new house, where they remain as dust, today.

I wonder about the man, my parent’s friend, when did he discover his compromised collection. Did he read them once, and just add them to the collection, my secret kept forever? Or did his 401K vanish, requiring him to sell his Playboys on Ebay, hoping to fetch thousands and thousands of dollars, now turned to dust after being shoved in a stonewall? It still remains a mystery, just like those girls as they were back in the day, shot through gauze, through Vaselined lenses. Big natural bosoms that defied gravity, baby bottle nipples, their bushes all full of wonder.

FILTHY GIRL

It was the end of a long hot session. I’d spent the entire day in my kitchen, completely clearing out every base and top cabinet, every last drawer. Hauling cast iron cookware to far regions of my apartment. Sifting through and clearing out decades of grimy assundry crap. On all fours, under the sink, up and down the stepladder until the cupboards were all clear. The demolition guys were due first thing in the morning, was an 85 degree Sunday, I was feeling disgusting, sweaty, and satisfied with my progress.

I got into the elevator hauling two Hefty’s of recycling down to the basement. I live in the penthouse, my neighbor, Steve, Joan’s wife got in the floor below. I was slick and rank, all tied up in a do-rag, wife beater and Old Navy sleep shorts. “Heyyy,” he said in a tone that was disturbingly reminiscent of “The Fonz”. “You look pretty sexy.” I looked up from my bags, with a “ppfft!” (He’s giving me crap, to top off my trash). But he was focused on my gestalt, taking it all in, “don’t try to deny it, you know you look hot.”

He was headed to the basement, too – with one deconstructed box from a small camera to recycle, his wife running a pretty tight ship. Upon landing at our subterranean destination, he held the door for me, as though we were entering an expensive nightclub, looking at me like I was wearing a low cut silk Versace. He dispensed of his 1oz. of cardboard and returned to the elevator, I began sorting my two bags of paper, plastic, glass; emtied tequila bottles, sticky Triple Sec, a cheap menora, vegetarian cookbooks from a phase. I noticed that he was holding the elevator door open; I was barely through sorting bag one. “Steve”, I called out with feigned appreciation, “I’m gonna be a while.” “Nope,” his voice thick, “I’m holding it for you.” Indeed.

This isn’t the first time this ironic attraction has occurred. I was in my twenties. It was a humid August morning in Connecticut, the heat never relenting from the night before. I was at the beach at 7 AM, sneaking a smoke away from my parent’s radar sense of smell. I hadn’t showered, my face was slick, my hair in desperate need of shampoo. My body: perspiration on top of dried perspiration mingled with tanning oil. The Red Alpha Romeo broke my smoking solace. It approached slowly, like a cop looking for teenagers in the act. It was a convertible, the 30 something man drove alongside me very slowly without stopping. He was incredible, I instantly regretted my obviously unwashed state. The car stopped just a few feet ahead of mine and slowly slid back towards me, until our windows met. That was the day I realized that fashion and perfume advertising is The Big Lie.

I have bought 600 dollar dresses, spent countless hours coiffing my hair, nails, and nether regions. I have a virtual wine cellar of French fragrances. But none of that has panned out quite the same way as a day of ignored hygiene.

Is it the scent you put off, that calls to every Tom, Dick, and Pepe Le Pew? Me, fully doused in a thick coat of pheromones that no money can buy? Or is it the fact that when I’m literally dripping in disarray that I simply don’t give a shit, that the last thing on my mind is game? So, is being filthy dirty the unintended ultimate game?

You could never go into a dinner date dabbing your juices behind each ear. Or wearing panties fresh out of the dirty clothes hamper. Still, my elevator encounter, and delectable drive by guy make me think about it. But the fact is, you just can’t plan those soiled encounters, they happen serendipidously – after a long day of weeding, or waxing the car – it’s the fruits of your labor, squared.

WHO THE HECK AM I WRITING THIS FOR?

There's a problem with my blog. The people in my life can’t stand to read it.

First, there is my brother Rob, to whom I owe this whole blog thing to. He had been hocking me to get off my butt and blog for months, he actually set claudtalks up for me. Now, he is forced to avert his eyes to my postings, it's sexually explicit content penned by his sister. He wisely warned me not to write anything that I wouldn’t want the entire world to see, after I panicked about the guy I f*ck’s parents' potentially filth based first impression of me. On the other hand, Rob is still a great supporter, “I just had to set you up with the big pile of paper, throw on a little gasoline, knew you’d toss the lit match, and WFPOOF!!”

Then there’s my close friend Sam. Raised Muslim, now a grown up enlightened guy. He regularly expresses his concern over the nature of my content, blames it on the unfortunate influence of the ne'er-do-well man in my life. Yet, I have always dreamed of reporting my wickedness: the back-of-the-station wagon rides in high school, the cliché advertising biz trysts, my deep affection for psychologically challenged men. I love to see his knitted brow, as he scans through his print out of the blog du jour, like a teacher with poised red pen.

Brother Mike, he’s the business wiz of the family, who cautions me about potential employers. The HR folks who hold the purse strings to the six figures I seek, who Google perspective hires, turning my blog exploits into a damning resume. Fact is, many of my former bosses are friends on Facebook, herald my blogposts, yet never mention the possibility of freelance. Could it be that the claudtalks brand of leather harnesses, sex toys, and panties implies a lapsed affinity for the core brand values of toothpaste, cookies, and asthma remedies?

My ex-boyfriend Brian has expressed discomfort about reading about current love-making with my give it to the hilt and ‘til it hurts leathered-out hardcore man. An invaluable source of input, he is a gifted English teacher, a great writer in his own right, his sister a New York Times bestselling author. His insights are now withheld, save for his “applauding” my sickening to him fearless personal disclosure. Although should I take a three day break from posting, he’ll send an email inquiry signed “The Stalker”, so I suppose he is still a reluctant fan.

Then there are my girlfriends. Like Kristine, who over dinner last night winced at the mention of my blog. She recently added a deft comment under on of my blogposts, but said she only skimmed the piece she remarked on. She’s firmly in the camp of TMI with her BFF.

Yet, I get anywhere from 80, to 370 visits a day. Who are my fans? There’s Owen, A.K.A., “The Owen Show”, possibly my strongest supporter, and not just for the ego building blogposts that extol him as a sexual Demigod. Always at the ready with the compliment of a stiff c*ck, his praise takes an even deeper dive with specific, constructive, actionable feedback, the kind of enthused encouragement that usually one only receives from a loving parent; not to mention the priceless, side splittingly outrageous blogpost comments he adds that often eclipse the content and ignite flame wars that burn well past midnight. My dear friend Mel, who has been a rock star supporter from day one, who insists that big bucked published female authors of autobio-smut have nothin’ on me. I question her bias, as she is brilliant, and exceedingly well read – but nonetheless allows me to buy into the fairy princess-in-a-push-up-bra fantasy that my smirk of a photo could one day appear on a book jacket. I also must mention my friend Amy: a cynically sage, deftly funny, dauntingly intelligent critic. She sifts through the sexually transparent content, fishes out the bigger, more personal ideas, and explains the differences to me. Then there’s Sue Schongar Whitten on Facebook. A girl I was once nice to in the 3rd grade. She always gives the thumbs up on my blogposts on the Book of Face, and reminds me that I’m not just writing for my hard core audience. Vinny P, a fan, a friend, a vocal supporter on Facebook, and one time muse. Vinny U, who’s exuberant praise feeds my insatiable ego. And Giles, Owen’s brother, who I suspect has been a silent follower, who’s “well written, Claudia” can make my year. His disarming wit, MENSA intelligence, and subtly brilliant Facebook discourse makes me suspect that he ‘s simply being kind to the woman that gives his brother emotional support, exceptional head and incomparable weekend breakfasts.

To all the rest of you, the followers of claudtalks, I thank you. I am a slave to your visits, I pander to your need for filth, and pay the price with disenfranchised family members, grossed out friends, and potential employers.