WriteOutLoud

Wild Thing

(inspired, yet once again, by Dale)

"You won't be able to understand her," the department head warns, in the process of giving me the rundown on the kids I'm about to start on Romeo and Juliet.  "She's from South Central, she only speaks gangsta, and she's downright nasty.  Terrible family background, of course.  Smart, though."  He shakes his head sadly.

Sure enough, there she is--rough, dark hair straightened and home-bleached in orange chunks, upper lip curled in a snarl Elvis could learn something from.

She isn't my first problem, though.  All fifteen of these fine-arts boarding-school inmates, grades 9 through 12, are hyenas, apparently, so I begin by gently informing them of the conventions of civil discourse ("We raise our hands to speak, we listen attentively to each other, we do not interrupt each other, we most particularly do not interrupt ME" etc.), which startles all of them to attention.

Eventually, sure enough, she raises her hand and launches into something like, "That Mercutio dude, man, he be DOWN wit da HOOD, know what I'm sayin'?  Like he be da MAN wit da THANG goin' ON!"

"Martine. " [not her real name]  Keeping my tone as neutral as possible, "In this class, we speak American Standard English in order to make ourselves best understood."

Lonnnnnng moment.  She's looking into my eyes hard, really searching, for I don't know what, but she blinks first.  Then, "Oh.  OK."  And "Never mind, I forgot what I was going to say."  Not pouting, just passing. 

The following week, here she is:  "Oh man, Doc, damn--WHY does Mercutio have to DIE?  He's got all the best poetry in the play!"

"Good question, Martine.  Ideas, anyone?"  It goes on like that:  she always has thoughtful, smart, impassioned questions and comments.  She takes her time, thinks on her feet, expresses herself economically and clearly.

Halfway through the term, she sticks around after class, says abruptly, "I paint, you know."

"You paint."

"Yeah.  Pictures."

"But you're here [at the fine arts school, where each student has a concentration, and there's no crosspollination except in academic courses] as a writer--"

"Yeah, I know, but I just picked that when I came here, I don't know why.  I really paint."

"Hm.  May I see?"

"Yeah, maybe next week, I got an appointment right now--" and she's out the door.

After the next class, we go to her dorm room [am I supposed to be doing this? could I conceivably not do this?] and there, amid the chaos of two girls' stuff in 10' x 10' are stacks of portraits in acrylics on 18 x 24 posterboard ("Can't afford canvas!"), dozens of them, faces painted from memory, several series of people she's lived with, who took her in off the street; a series of figures at a bus stop in South Central ("4AM, you see some real characters down there!")--all in wild, vibrant colors straight from the tube ("Nah, I don't mix"), sometimes nail polish when she runs out of paint.  Dark, evocative, so good I'm gasping.  Never had a lesson in her life.

The next week, I bring her the catalog from an exhibit of "untaught" "outsider" art I saw in Boston a few years back.  She practically eats it with her eyes:  "Do I have to give this back?"  "Not if you don't want to." 

Last week--the last week--the seniors give readings over two nights; the first night is so bad, I seriously consider bailing.  But Martine is up the second night, and I told her I'd be there.  Her paintings are all over the lobby walls; everyone is surprised; nobody but her roommate knew she painted.  All the readers are better the second night, but she blows the roof off.  In full, gorgeous stage makeup, her hair dyed back natural, wearing a pleated miniskirt, modest tee, and black fishnets, she doesn't just read--she acts out two stories, in full gangsta, real stories that have all of us on the edges of our seats, they're so compelling, suspenseful, funny, poignant . . . true.

Afterward:  "[gasp]!  You showed up!"  Big hug.

"Well, of course.  I said I would."

"And next week?  We got a final, right, so I'll see you?"

"Right."

"OK, good.  Now I gotta go wash this shit off my face!"  And off she goes again.  She'll be at Howard next year.  And where, after that? 

Anywhere she wants, is my guess.

MY TREEHOUSE: GIRLS ONLY! NO BOYS ALLOWED!

Without actually meaning to--in fact, through no agency of my own, really--I have managed to prolong my birthday festivities thanks to a visit from my non-biological sister, Chorusgirl, who doesn't have a blog or I'd link you.  She and my also non-bio-sister Pica are the other two legs of the three-legged stool that is my life.

Chorusgirl and her husband, the twinkly-eyed cowboy-accountant, live about 3 hours away in bucolic splendor, but she never has visited me here in the desert because she has been busy raising children, horses, dogs, cats and pretty much anything that will let her mother it.  But suddenly she just upped and drove out here in order to watch me teach, visit my brother (whom she hadn't seen in 20 years), take me out to dinner, cut my hair, let me give her a purple pedicure, admire the Tin Chateau and environs, drink just enough but not too much wine, eat chocolate, go shopping, gossip, tease me about stuff only she knows--i.e., share with me all the frivolous (vs trivial) pursuits girls like to do when there are no boys around.

We liked this so much, we've decided to reconvene at her house in the fairly immediate future, for an extended adventure we're calling Paint Camp, which means I show up with my easel and paintbox, and she gets out hers, and we Paint Without Permission for several days, see what happens.  Even though there are enough beds to go around, I'm considering sleeping on the enormous trampoline out in the yard under the oak trees, surrounded by beds of lavender.  We will ride her horses.  I will kiss her dog (the world's most perfect black lab) disgustingly much.  It will be that kind of interlude, just the ticket for this girl who's been too verbal for too goddamned long!

   

Connect the Dots?

Hamlet says, "Nothing's true but thinking makes it so" --

And the immense pleasure of gift certificates: the givers' bounty of choice--you get to pick whatever you want!  If you want something to be true, you have the means to make it so.  What luxury!

Especially on my birthday. 

When The Going Gets Tough,

the tough get out the nail polish.  Today's Deep Thought is inspired by one of my favorite writers, Cynthia Heimel of Sex Tips for Girls plus If You Can't Live Without Me, Why Aren't You Dead? among other classics of the serio-journalist style. 

In Sex Tips, Heimel taught me something that's served me well over the past 20 years and is doing likewise today:  the crucial distinction between what is trivial and what is frivolous.  "All things trivial are objects, and all things frivolous are actions," she tells us.  "We must eschew anything trivial.  We must embrace all that is frivolous."

Here is her list of Things Trivial:  food processors, tax shelters, committees, life insurance, dress shields, encounter groups, conceptual art, nouvelle cuisine [it was the 80s], business suits, Volvo station wagons, mortgages, designer sunglasses.

Things Frivolous include dancing, eating raspberries, driving in convertibles, drinking champagne, kissing, telling jokes, planting tomatoes, lying on the beach, talking on the phone, singing, fucking, and buying dresses.

Which is why I'm about to go outside, lie in the sun in my pink bikini, and paint my toenails a delightful shade of deep lilac even though, for all I know, the world is coming to an end.

The Buzzkills Do Mother's Day--and I KICK ASS!

It doesn't happen often because I am a perfectionist who cares too much about good food, I have a small, ill-equipped kitchen, and my dishwasher is dead, but when I tie on an apron, LOOK OUT!

What came over me, I have no idea, but I invited all the Buzzkills over for Mother's Day Dinner:  my 83-year-old mother, her two sisters, 76 and 80, the toxic 76-year-old's boyfriend, my brother and his delinquent son.  The usual family dinner agenda involves showing up, drinking whatever you can get your hands on, wolfing down the grub, and making a speedy exit, usually in under 90 minutes.

These people, whom I have never invited to my house all at once, stayed four hours.  "Oh, Honey, the flowers are lovely--where did you get them?"  "I grew them."  "Are all these hors d'oeuvres?"  "Yes."  "What's this rolled-up thing with the parsley?"  "Salmon."  Toxic Aunt's boyfriend, NY gangster, wants to know, "What's this green dip stuff?  Can I have the recipe?"  "Guacamole."  Toxic Aunt:  "This is so delicious--is it a recipe?" (vs. something off the back of a Campbell's Soup can).  "Well, yes, it's Chicken Marbella."  "What are these things in it?"  "Prunes."  "PRUNES?"  "Yes.  Do you like them?"  "They're . . . delicious!"  Her boyfriend, munching tomato/mozzarella/basil [from the garden] salad, reaches over and gives me a hug:  "Bella ragazza--mozzarella buffala!"  "Si, Tio Antonio." [Though I have no idea what he's doing with TA, I like him a lot.] "Grazie!"  Kiss-kiss.  My brother, nascent chef, just starting to wake up to food, wants to know what the fruit is:  "Melts in my mouth!"  "Papaya."  "What's the dressing?"  "Lime juice."  "That's all?"  "Yes."  "DAMN!"

Every dish I own is dirty, and my dishwasher is broken.  But I don't care.  I have disarmed these people, brought them into my world for just a few hours, made them happy, satisfied.  What cook could hope for more?

"But is it spiritchul ENOUGH?"

I am generally uncomfortable in the presence of abstractions.

I used to be an extrovert.

But now I'm not, so much.

You know those personality inventory tests that ask, among other ludicrously oversimplified questions, if you're "spiritual"?  I  never understand the question.  If it means "Do you belong to a church?" my answer is "God forbid!"  If it means "Do you sometimes go to church?" my answer is "Yes. Sort of."  But I always hope it has nothing to do with organized religion. 

I have many reasons for not wanting to talk about this subject.  But Dale has me going.  He's a Buddhist, he knows why, and he explains it well.

Other than a few months as a Girl Scout in fifth grade, I am not a joiner.   Other than a few recent years when I thought I might convert to Judaism, organized religion and I are not friends.  I was raised Presbyterian; as a child, I often fainted in church through sheer boredom and lack of breakfast.  I keeled over so often ("Oopsie!--there she goes again!") that my parents actually had me tested for epilepsy.   The bio-dad was a deacon and my Sunday-school teacher; what fresh hell that was, every week!  All I learned was what a hypocrite looked like, close up.

Decades later, entirely by accident, I happened to hear Peter Gomes preach.  I had never heard anyone in a pulpit be interesting, so right away I was all set to join his church, but it's not joinable; anybody who wants to can just show up and graze on whatever crumbs drop from the table he sets for the undergraduates.  He calls it "the church that leaves you alone--no bake sales, no recruitment drives, no missionarying of any kind."  What a relief!  Lots of topnotch spiritchul teaching for free!  And now he's on the Internet, so that's what I call "going to church"--listening to him.

But still there is this pesky notion of "spirituality"--what IS it, if it even IS something?  How can it not be something different to everyone?  How can a bunch of people all do it together?  I ask this even though I never miss a Yom Ha Sho'ah commemoration if I can help it.  Paradox:  isn't it the essence of spirituality?  the thing you can't prove but that you believe in unconditionally? isn't it a form of love?  disinterested, free, unique, personal positive energy moving into and through you, that you improve to the best of your ability before you send it on?

Even though I'm so banged up at the moment that I can't do much yoga, I do what I can.  It's been over a year now, still with the same teacher, whose gentle patience, understanding and wisdom keep me coming back.  While she's moving us through the poses (I love that--"poses"--what most people do all day! just not in comfortable clothes), she talks spiritchul stuff about living our dharma while working out our karma.  And so on.  I twist and turn and lift myself, laugh at the serial pops in my spine, wince at the pains in my right shoulder/elbow/wrist--"Modify, Doc!" she reminds me.  "Just do what you can!"

Isn't that spirituality--doing what you can? figuring out what you have to give, and giving it nonjudgmentally, disinterestedly, without thought of recognition or return?  to a friend, to a lover, to a classroom full of strangers?  Friendship, love and teaching are my spiritual practice.  The places where I feel most myself (living my dharma) and most hopeful (working out my karma) are where I feel happiest.   So why join some organized group?  I organize my own groups!  Am I missing something here?  Tell me--

"Are These Yours?": My Hero, Juan Lopez

Once a decade or so, I lose my keys.  Or lock them in the car.  Today, I wasn't sure which situation I was in.

All I knew was, I wanted to drive away but had no keys in my purse or briefcase or pockets.  They could be hiding under stuff (ok, junk) in car.  Or not; couldn't tell.  Retraced steps, embarrassed self in various campus locations: "Excuse me? Has anyone seen--?" etc.  No keys.  Bad enough, but worse is the little folder attached to the keys, which holds all my ID, ATM, Blockbuster, library cards.  Methodical as usual, I nevertheless felt incipient panic as I called AAA--my identity could be spreading all over the internet right that minute!!!

I was almost whimpering into the phone to the AAA gal:  "Yuh-yeh-yess, I checked everywhere!" when I heard a rumble behind me and turned to see an old red Camaro lumber to a stop.  The TDH driver got out, smiled sweetly at me, held out my keys and said, without a trace of mockery, "Are these yours?"

"OHJESUSYES!  Yes they are!  Those are MY KEYS!"

"Well, I seen them hanging out of the door there, so I thought I should pick them up and I just got out of class right now so here you go--"  Hands me my keys, nice as pie, smiles, and is about to just climb back into the Camaro and drive away! 

I managed to get his name, though--Juan Lopez, the local equivalent of John Smith--and his phone number.  I'll get even.  Or almost.

This is Not Julia Roberts:

Or a criminal.  Nor, despite the resemblance, is she a victim of Abu Ghraib.  Jennifer Wilbanks, 32, of Duluth, Georgia (pop. 10,000) is a victim of this culture's compulsion to turn precious moments that should be private into vulgar public spectacles.

Maybe I'm wrong; maybe she just suddenly realized she didn't want to marry the guy, and bolted.  She made a mess of it, of course.  She should have at least left a note ("Dear Bubba, I'm sorry, but I just can't do this" would have sufficed) so nobody would think she was dead.  I suppose there's some pathology at work there.

But what if it was nothing personal?  What if she likes Bubba just fine, but the logistics of marrying him in front of 650 people got to be Just Too Much?--the food, cake, booze, music, table decorations, party favors (those little wads of candied almonds bunched up in tulle at each place--what if the little bows came off?), the white matchbooks engraved in gold "Bubba and Jennifer, April 28, 2005" (I bet they still have those, down South)--

And 14 bridesmaids!  What one, same dress could possibly look good on 14 different women?  So the fat ones would be grumpy, the thin ones smug, everybody in a bad mood, their hairpieces not sticking on, their flowers drooping, half of them pouting because they've hated Jennifer since 6th grade but their mothers are friends, their feet hurt, they hate the groomsmen they have to walk down the aisle with and are expected to dance with at the reception--

Those 14 groomsmen, Bubba's own four blood brothers plus ten ATOs from Georgia Tech, all of them with initials instead of names--what would be left of them after the bachelor party at the Elks' Club the night before?  Would there have been a stripper?  (Would Bubba have . . . oh NO!  Perish the thought!)  Would they all be slamming down hair-of-the-dog jello shots, weaving down the aisle, green around the gills, trying not to breathe while escorting Aunt Bessie and Cousin Myra Jo to their seats on the bride's side of the aisle?  Would they even remember there is a bride's side of the aisle?

And oh Lord, the relatives:  a nightmare all their own!  Her sister-in-law only two weeks out of rehab--Bubba's slutty cousin Margiebeth with another one of those necklines down to her kneecaps despite having no cleavage to speak of--Daddy's pacemaker's been acting up--Mama's nerve pills aren't working like they used to--and it'll be the first time Aunt Loreen and Uncle J.M. have seen each other since their divorce was final--

On top of it all, Jennifer's got to tart herself up in that fluffy WalMart wedding dress that's too tight in the waist (Aunt Bertha will whisper to anyone who'll listen, "See?  Toldja!  Four months along!") and itches so bad all around her neck and down her back, and those pointy shoes she can hardly walk in.  And what if her hair doesn't come out right, so her veil hangs funny, and everybody notices?  Her hands always shake when she's nervous, so what if she can't hold her flowers steady, and everybody notices?  And she gets sweat stains under the arms of her dress, and everybody notices?  And she stutters during her vows, and everybody notices?  She's 32 years old, for godsake!  All Duluth has been standing around, looking at its watches for several years now, wondering if that pretty Wilbanks girl--well, not really a girl anymore (so do you suppose she's . . . that way?)--would ever get married.  So Jennifer has to get it exactly right.  Because everyone's looking!

How did this happen, she wonders?  It was so romantic last Fourth of July when Bubba proposed at the Elks' picnic and fireworks.  She started her diet right away, and it worked!  She lost 25 pounds!  Now, of course, at 5'8" and 123 pounds, she's so weak she can barely stand up, but those diet pills keep her going real nice.  She takes a couple extra--it's four days before The Wedding, after all--gotta get those last three pounds off!--and heads out for her run.

And just keeps going, all the way to the bus station.  The next one's leaving in 5 minutes--ironically, for Las Vegas.  She gets on it.

"Basically she was just very concerned about the pending wedding and very nervous about it," Chief Schultz said. "She decided that she needed some time alone."

Who could blame her?  Who wouldn't panic?  But this poor girl ends up stymied in her pathetic attempt to reclaim herself:  in the world news with a blanket on her head instead of a veil, so everybody noticed, after all.