Wait...Wait...Wait...Okay.

The musings of a sometimes-recluse and (marginally successful) human impersonator. Here you may find satirical essays, disjointed journal entries, maybe even some artwork--but, rest assured, whatever it may be, it will all come from my brain-thing.

[waitwaitwaitokay]

Wednesday

I don’t sleep anymore. I act out this pale imitation where I clench my eyelids together and try to be very, very still. I wait out the earth’s rotation. I wait to feel the red heat of morning on my skin. That’s how I know it’s time. I don’t feel emotion. I do open my mouth and scream. Not for primal therapy, but as an involuntary reflex—like a discarded organ animated by electrodes. I turn on the coffeemaker. I watch a YouTube video of a Japanese woman eating a passionfruit. I polish the memory of my teeth grazing his inner thigh… And I’ve cut my leg with the razor, mindlessly. I can’t feel it, but I can see the blood. There are 75 dead in Pakistan. No, there are 80 civilians dead in Pakistan. I put on pants. They are rather inexpensive pants, mass produced, made of thin material. There is a bit of uneven stitching on the interior that scratches my skin but, after several minutes of wear, it’s no longer discernible. I ride the subway to work. I ride the subway home. There is a life being lived. Somewhere. The kitchen window of my apartment faces the kitchen window of someone else’s apartment. Blinds apathetically hang over portions of both. Sometimes we wash our dishes simultaneously, symmetrically. Sometimes I am naked. Sometimes, in the other apartment, the lights are turned off. While I lie in bed, eyes clenched, I think of the immortal jellyfish. Within the vacuum of the laboratory, they have mastered transdifferentiation. Though they seem unable—or unwilling—to elude death in the wild.   What is the nature of the soul of a jellyfish, I wonder. And does it ever get the urge to scream, only to find itself mouthless?

[waitwaitwaitokay]

2016: Year in Review

As 2017 approaches, it seems like the appropriate time to reflect on the year that has passed. Though it may be easy to dwell on the more challenging and negative times we faced in 2016, I’d like to take a moment to acknowledge and appreciate all of the positive things that transpired.

Most notably, of course, was the iceberg in Antarctica that saw absolutely no violence or oppression within its half-mile span for the entire duration of 2016. Peacefully drifting through the South Atlantic, the total lack of bloodshed and turmoil made this icy monolith truly remarkable. There was not a single mass shooting, no declarations of war, no devastating terrorist attack of any kind—not even so much as a civilian enduring a particularly emotionally trying paper cut. While floating in the frigid ocean, utterly no fracking was performed on this noteworthy iceberg. Hacking scandals of all varieties were completely unseen, nor were there any instances of cyber-bullying, which experts largely attribute to there being no telecommunication networks within the iceberg’s vicinity. A true beacon of hope in a world gone mad, this half-mile wide (at the beginning of 2016; the most recent measurements are closer to a quarter-mile wide) chunk of ice sets an admirable example for the rest of the planet.

Another cause for celebration, I’m sure you’ll agree, is that Steve Harwell (of Smash Mouth fame) remained entirely alive throughout the year. Somebody once told him that the world was gonna roll him—but not in 2016! Multiple sources have confirmed that Harwell spent the year regularly inhaling and processing life-sustaining oxygen, as well as pumping a wholly necessary amount of blood through his body’s intricate network of capillaries and veins. While thousands of other human beings perished over the course of this past year, Steve Harwell remained steadfastly and unapologetically alive.

Puppies were still a thing. Despite the insurmountably crushing force of 2016, these tiny mammalian creatures persevered and continued to exist to the delight and relief of many. Widely known for their therapeutic properties and propensity for snuggles, puppies were not added to the endangered species list at any point during the year. While some grew old in shelters or were horrifyingly euthanized, others were confirmed to definitely exist and spread unadulterated joy to all.  

Perhaps the most significant thing about 2016 was that no unfathomably massive asteroid struck and demolished Earth. Despite there being a near-infinite number of space rocks and debris hurtling around our solar system at truly unimaginable velocities, no asteroids large enough to cause the total extinction of all known biological life collided with our planet. Admittedly, this could also be viewed as cruel and unusual punishment, given the other events that took place in 2016. Perhaps, if this upcoming year runs a similar course, we will have the privilege of being struck by a world-ending asteroid in 2017. Here’s to hoping.

Happy New Year!

[waitwaitwaitokay]

HOW TO LOSE 20LBS IN 2 MONTHS

In the past year I’ve lost 42lbs (likely more, as I wasn’t weighing myself for a while.) However, I’ve really gotten serious about losing weight in the past two months and have shed 20lbs in that time frame. Here’s a list of steps I followed to achieve that loss. 

*DISCLAIMER: Results may vary. Everyone’s journey is different.

 1.       Enter a relationship in which you feel unprecedented levels of self-consciousness and insecurity. Turn into a pushy, petty, crazy mess.  

2.       Stop taking care of yourself. Mentally check out of all responsibilities. Quietly recede from the lives of friends and family.

3.       Consider ending the relationship.

4.       Have your significant other end the relationship. Listen to them wax poetic about, “All the good times we had. Like our first date.” Because it was clearly all downhill from there…

5.       Realize that most everything in your terminated relationship had actually been a lie.

6.       For one single day, be massively depressed. To the point of physical pain. Your organs should feel like they’re in a vice. You should have difficulty breathing. Any movement will be strenuous. Somehow power through the work day. *Note: It is important that Step 6 only last for 24 hours; any longer may be hazardous to your health.  

7.       Get angry.

8.       No, seriously, get angrier than you’ve ever been before.

9.       Resolve to never feel that doubtful, insecure, and worthless in a relationship again. Refuse to be a human cushion for someone else’s fragile ego after a lifetime of fulfilling that role.

10.   Start counting every calorie you put into your body. Religiously.

11.   At the beginning, abstain from alcohol so that you’re unable to numb the anger and overwhelming surge of emotions that course through you on a daily basis. Feel the feelings. Dissect the feelings. Process everything. Start learning.

12.   Walk around Manhattan like you’re trying to map every inch of it before it sinks into the ocean. Walk from your apartment in Washington Heights to Midtown every weekend, venturing down Broadway, absorbing the city and its beauty. Replace the memories you created with your ex on each street with new ones of slowly discovering an inner peace.

13.   Buy a food scale.

14.   Join an online forum where you must post daily about how you’re trying to meet your weight loss goals. Let the support of internet strangers help fuel your efforts. Let the slight fear of their judgment keep your bad decisions in check.  

15.   Don’t intentionally have “cheat days”; realize that this isn’t a game that can be cheated. Do fall off the wagon, derail, and fuck up on occasion…then press forward.

16.   Reach a weight that you haven’t been at since high school.

17.   Dig through your closet and start wearing clothes that haven’t fit in years.

18.   Start feeling vaguely comfortable in your own skin for the first time in your life.  

19.   Throw caution to the wind and have a one night stand. Feel more comfortable, appreciated, and cared for by a virtual stranger than you ever were in your relationship.

20.   For the first time in your life, genuinely get excited to be single.

21.   Realize that you’re losing the weight for yourself. Not to be attractive to others. Not to be accepted by anyone. Not to adhere to some societal standard of beauty.

22.   Know that 20lbs in 2 months is only the beginning. The journey is just starting. It’s going to take a while. It’s not going to be easy. And as cliché as it may sound, know that you need to take it one step at a time.

[waitwaitwaitokay]

A show about dykes and faggots

CAPTION: Two queer friends discuss Fun Home the musical.

I play a very small (professional, but non-artistic) role in supporting the Broadway production of Fun Home. My friend comments, “I like what's been done with the new key art. It really captures the show. But the language used in all the marketing—now and when it was at The Public—sort of skirts around the actual subject. ‘Oh, it’s about a family and relationships…’ No. You know what? Let’s just say it—it’s a show about dykes and faggots.”

This musical is universal—it is about family and relationships. It’s about self-discovery and acceptance. It’s about the irrevocable damage of denial, and the liberation that truth can bring.

But this musical is also specific—it is about dykes and faggots.

We live in a country where marriage equality has been a hot topic in public discourse for the past decade. In our attempts to assuage the hetero, cis-gender population, our campaign slogan has always been, “We are the same as you.” People turn on the TV and watch Ellen DeGeneres nonchalantly talk about her wife, or the straight and gay kids on “Glee” tackle a Top 40s hit together in perfect harmony. We’ve come so far as a society (I don’t hear anyone calling her “Ellen DeGenerate” anymore); I am endlessly grateful to see such a shift within my lifetime.

But we’ve lost something along the way. We’ve been homogenized.  

Of course we all share a common humanity and the universal experiences that come with it. But we’re not “all the same.” Straights ignoring the otherness of queers is similar to white people being confronted with the subject of race and asserting, “I don’t see race; I’m colorblind.” Though well-intentioned, a very real and very different experience is being negated.

Even more specifically, the experience of queer women is muted and lost in the noise. There was a time when “gay” referred specifically to homosexual men. But, as the national discussion of same-sex marriage gained momentum, “the gays” became a catch-all term for anyone who didn’t fit into a neat, hetero-normative box. The real conflict wasn’t about allowing lesbians to marry each other, after all—they are either butch or androgynous and consequently invisible to the male gaze, or they are femmes who are objectified by it. Much like everything else in our society, unless it’s a direct threat or appeal to heterosexual masculinity, it is of little importance.

But Fun Home shines an unrepentant spotlight on a strong, queer, female protagonist.

Based on Alison Bechdel’s heartbreakingly beautiful graphic memoir, Fun Home is the story of a lesbian cartoonist digging into the past, trying to discern the truth about her father’s life. Father and daughter seem to be traveling on inverse trajectories; while Alison blossoms into her newly realized lesbian identity, her father recedes deeper and deeper into the closet.    

There’s an entire song devoted to Alison’s first sexual experience with her college girlfriend. In a video filmed for Broadway.com, book writer & lyricist Lisa Kron essentially says that “it’s not about love. It’s about sex. Lesbian sex has been invisible.” Queer relationships depicted in the arts are too frequently censored for the sake of appearing inoffensive to heterosexual viewers. When Alison sings rapturously about “changing [her] major to sex with Joan,” and “foreign studies to Joan’s inner thighs,” one can’t help but feel that there are barriers being demolished and new paths being paved.

Conversely, when a prepubescent Alison encounters an “old school butch” delivery woman entering the luncheonette where she and her father are dining, she sings (or tries to sing) about an indescribable sense of identification. Little Alison doesn’t have the vocabulary to express exactly how she feels, but she’s compelled to try. “It's probably conceited to say, but I think we're alike in a certain way. I...um... Your swagger and your bearing, and the just right clothes you're wearing, your short hair and your dungarees, and your lace up boots. And your keys—oh—your ring of keys.”

The incomparable, wildly talented, 11-year-old Sydney Lucas will be performing “Ring of Keys” for a national audience on the Tony Awards tonight. For a brief moment, people all over the country will be witnessing this exquisitely crafted song. Viewers will see and hear what it’s like for a queer kid to realize, for the first time, that they’re not completely alone in this world. Just thinking about it brings tears to my eyes.

No one wakes up one morning to confidently discover their sexuality; there are no instantaneous “Eureka!” moments. It’s a slow realization; an excavation of what was always there. In my personal experience, it was an internal war between my true feelings and the dictatorial Catholic upbringing that implied those feelings were unnatural. Just as I entered puberty, I was subjected to my father’s heated, Fox News-fueled rants about “the depraved, disease-ridden homosexuals” who were ripping apart the very fabric of our society. I remember channel surfing one afternoon after school in the ‘90s and finding a Ricki Lake episode about the “bisexual myth”; guests were attempting to force their friends to “choose one or the other—you’re either straight, or you’re gay.” When my Catholic guilt convinced me to tell my mother that, at 11 years old, I had kissed a boy, she laughed and said, “Oh, honey, that’s fine—I don’t care. Just as long as you don’t come home someday and say, ‘Mom, I kissed little Susie’…”

Still, I was lucky to grow up in a post-Stonewall world, after the peak of the AIDS epidemic. Queer people could finally step out of the closet, even if they were met with confusion or hostility. They began to appear in the media (in a positive capacity.) As a pre-teen, I idolized the gender-bending Canadian comedy troupe, The Kids in the Hall (and still do!) Group member Scott Thompson, in particular, was a poster boy for the gay subculture of the ‘90s. There’s even a sketch he wrote and starred in that’s devoted to deconstructing the word “Faggot.” It was subversive. It wasn’t about pleading for acceptance—it was about demanding acknowledgement.      

Fun Home operates in a similar way. The straight audience members aren’t afforded much hand-holding into this potentially uncomfortable territory. Alison and her father, Bruce, aren’t treated like sexless cartoon characters who pander to a more conservative audience, spouting vague throwaway lines about love and acceptance. These are real human beings. These are real life experiences. This is truth that has been masterfully crafted into a transformative and illuminating piece of art that will reverberate through history long after the jukebox and movie musicals lower their curtains.

This musical explores the dangers of stifling the truth. Alison longs to rewrite history and connect with her father over their shared queerness before his untimely death. In the most brilliant, soul-rending, passionate musical theatre song I’ve ever heard, “Telephone Wire,” Alison slips into the past and tries in vain to reach out to Bruce while they take a drive through their hometown. “This is where it has to happen! There must be some other chances. There's a moment I'm forgetting where you tell me you see me.” 

“FUN HOME: A new musical about dykes and faggots” isn’t a particularly catchy tagline. It’s not going to persuade middle-aged Alabamans to buy a pair of $150 tickets and book their flight to New York. I understand that. My friend understands that. Focusing on the universal themes of this show, and its unanimous acclaim, has been (and will continue to be) the plan. And it’s all true—you don’t have to be a lesbian to fall deeply in love with this flawlessly written, directed, acted, and designed production. I could write an entire novel on the exquisite craft of this show simply as a piece of theatre, regardless of subject matter. Sam Gold’s handling of the in-the-round staging is a true masterclass for any aspiring directors in the audience. Broadway legends Michael Cerveris and Judy Kuhn pour their entire souls into this story. Jeanine Tesori and Lisa Kron’s score and book are intelligent, meticulously rendered, and truly rival any classic Sondheim work. It has clearly been a labor of love for everyone involved—advertisers included. If using vague, broad language is what’s needed to get tourists into the Circle in the Square Theatre, that is the language that must be used.

Tonight, a Tony Award win for Best Musical could give Fun Home the nationwide recognition it deserves, and enough steam to keep its doors open on Broadway for years to come (though they are already playing to sold-out houses every night.) Like all award shows, the Tonys are political—they’re ultimately more about financial interests than artistic integrity. (Because, let’s be honest, if it were really about artistic integrity, there would be an award for Best Sound Design.)  Fun Home doesn’t have the mass market appeal that An American in Paris does (with its central heterosexual love story.) It’s certainly not as commercially viable as the uproariously funny and fun (if slightly less substantial) Something Rotten. I don’t think Fun Home is going to win. I bet my money on another show in the office Tony pool. But, good lord, I hope I’m wrong. I hope I never see that $5 again.

If Fun Home wins tonight, it could be truly revolutionary. It could herald a secure spot on Broadway for the intimate, socially important stories that are produced every day throughout this country’s regional theatres, college campuses, and in NYC’s own 20-seat downtown converted spaces. We are a nation growing thirsty for art of substance and honesty.

Everyone needs to see this show. Queer kids need to see themselves on a stage, completely unfiltered and unapologetic. But, more importantly, heterosexual mainstream audiences need to see this show. They need to see that dyke and that faggot. 

They need to see us.    

[waitwaitwaitokay]

Improved Poems

I recently saw Interstellar, and it reminded me that: "Oh, yeah. No one actually reads poetry. But it's, like, super convenient to quote famous poems when you want to seem super intelligent and stuff. Not the full poem. Just, y'know, the real meaty bits."

So I've taken the liberty of rewriting some famous poems--all meat, no filler. I've added nice little buttons so that whoever you're trying to impress won't notice it's only a tiny fragment of a bigger literary whats-it.

These are all yours, friends--drop 'em on a hot date or at a dinner party. You're welcome. 

"Two roads diverged in a yellow wood so I turned around and went back home."

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"Do not go gentle into that good night, Rage, rage, rage, let the beat drop."

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"I grow old… I grow old… I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled, and maybe a neon pink fanny pack."

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"Hope is the thing with feathers that hides under your bed making sinister noises. Do not close your eyes."

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"Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? No."

[waitwaitwaitokay]

Can I be real for a second?

Can I be real for a second? I am uncomfortable in my own skin. 

Can I be surreal for a second? There are elephants dripping out of the tap. 

Okay, back to being real. 

I kind of keep putting the whole "being happy" thing on the back burner because there are, like, other, more pressing things to worry about. Such as, you know, job security, figuring out how to deal with student loan debt, and hating myself. I don't have time to realize my self-worth--I'm too busy trying to make potential employers see my value. I mean, seriously, who has the time to be happy? A "New York minute" flies by and, having experienced nearly two year's worth of them, I can attest to this fact. There's just no time in the schedule to pencil in contentment.

I made the decision recently that, until I have made peace with my body--after a lifetime of being at war with it--I will not allow myself to love anyone. No single in New York has time for love, anyway. Drunken hookups: yes. Love: no way. It takes too much time and effort to accurately cultivate a lasting, meaningful bond based upon trust, understanding, and selflessness. I suppose, if I ever do feel comfortable in my own skin (which seems unlikely at this rate) I'll have to move to, I don't know, Idaho or something. I'll need to scour the hills of Idaho to find the last 20-something in America who holds the capacity for real, bona fide love. Are there hills in Idaho? I've never been. I've never had the time. 

Maybe it doesn't even exist. Maybe Idaho is just a state of mind.

Anyway... I think this decision was born out of a particular experience. As much as I try not to, I do sometimes have human emotions. I know, it's so stupid, but I'm told that it happens to all of us at some point or another. It's embarrassing, but I'll elaborate: 

I was at a friend's party. Partying. Talking with strangers. One of these strangers was a rather attractive (clearly out of my league), genuinely funny gentleman. He made me laugh--and that should have been a red flag right there. Humor is a weapon I'm defenseless against. I learn that he's a stand-up comedian, and all barriers come down. Cut to 3:00am in an uptown subway station. He's walked me there, and I've been babbling on about wanting to go to his next stand-up show. We are taking trains going in opposite directions. I say "goodbye," and he takes me in his arms and begins kissing me. Just like in the movies. I didn't realize that it could happen in real life too. Then he asks me an odd question. "Do you want me to come home with you?" I'm positive that was the question--though I'm hesitant to believe it. It's a question I've never had to deal with before, really. At the time, I thought: "He's just drunk, that's why he's moving so fast. But he's got my number. We'll wake up tomorrow, and laugh about it, and then take things slowly. This wouldn't be happening right now if he didn't see something in me--in my personality, in my own sense of humor. There's a connection here." My own answer surprised me nearly as much as the question had--"No." He continued to kiss me in an effort to change that answer. And--as nice as it all felt--the answer didn't change. I was convinced, in that moment, that I was worth more than a drunken one-night-stand--that's how drunk I was. I was that delusional.   

He got on one train. I got on another train. And we went in opposite directions. Our paths haven't crossed since.

I think, as a fat lady, I have to either accept what the Beer Goggle Gods offer to me, be fetishized, or remain alone. The latter is certainly the easiest and, right now, the most logical option. I've mandated a strict "no human feelings" rule on myself since this incident occurred. It hasn't stopped the drunken make-out sessions, but it has stopped the silly delusions that accompany them. I'm, like, somewhat fairly sure that this is a healthy situation. It's a rule I've been able to uphold. 

Until about a month ago.

I've never believed in love-at-first-sight. I've never believed that you can instantly feel a connection to someone just by glancing across a room. Or feel a spark without having exchanged any words.

And then it just...kind of happened...I think? Sort of? 

All this person has to do is flash that warm smile in my direction, and my knees turn into jelly. That vague, unplaceable accent sends a butterfly brigade straight to my gut. I couldn't think straight the last time we spoke and had to, with a massively red face, find an excuse to leave.

I barely know this person. We are virtual strangers. I don't know our mutual acquaintances well enough to discuss the matter--and if I ever mentioned it, they'd surely think I was crazy. (Although they probably already question my sanity, so it wouldn't be an enormous shift.) I'm questioning my own sanity. This person turns me into a speechless 13-year-old whenever we're in the same room. No one else has ever had that power.

Soon, I won't have an excuse to be in the same room with this person anymore. If I were comfortable in my skin, I might ask this person on a date. I might ask for their phone number. Or send a Facebook friend request. Or, like, at least add them on LinkedIn or something. But I'm not.

Can I be real for a second? I think I'm afraid to admit that being overweight might not be the biggest obstacle in my way of finding happiness or love.

Can I be surreal again? My apartment is flooded with elephants.   

[waitwaitwaitokay]

WOMEN, STOP! WHY? BECAUSE I SAY SO.

It's been a long time since I've written a satirical piece, so this was a fun exercise. I was actually going to write a sincere post on this subject, but feel that there's always far more truth in comedy than in angry rants. I guess I should set the scene by explaining what prompted this... Facebook. My Facebook newsfeed is, like, 80% links to feminist blog posts and articles about "women's issues". Probably because I'm friends with a lot of intelligent, strong, socially conscious women who like to read things and share them. And I do find many of these pieces intriguing and worthwhile... but, collectively, I sometimes wonder if they're doing more harm than good. The repetitiveness of this prose doesn't seem like change to me; it feels like we're stuck in a rut. I think women are self-aware enough now, in 2013, that we can recognize the use of Photoshop in advertising. We're not idiots. So why must we perpetually rant and rave and complain? Can't we talk about more important shit? And why should one writer decide to act as spokeswoman for an entire gender? Maybe there are little girls out there who didn't hate their bodies until "feminists" started telling them that that's what society already expects them to be doing. Food for thought. I hope you find the following essay intriguing and, more than anything else, you get a few laughs out of it. :)

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              There’s an alarming trend continuing to grow among young women. A practice that dates back thousands of years and, while obscenely archaic, still remains prominent in modern culture. A grotesque form of body modification that most girls feel obligated to pursue in order to feel feminine. When I interviewed 10-year-old Brooke Johnson about her desire to submit herself to such a barbaric procedure she merely shrugged. “Everybody does it,” she told me. Not only do young girls feel insurmountable peer pressure to conform to this misguided standard of beauty—they are also utterly brainwashed by The Media. Movies, magazines, television shows, commercials, and even Disney princesses have endorsed this enraging form of self-mutilation.

                Ear piercing.

                We have been sitting idly by for far too long as our daughters and sisters willingly fill their bodies with holes, slicing their skin, and inserting foreign objects into their bleeding wounds. This has been so normalized by The Media that we have grown utterly desensitized. Little girls now feel that their worth is measured by how many rings are in their ears. As someone with an internet connection and a vagina, I think I speak for all women when I say: The desire for pierced ears is a harmful psychological disorder.

                Miss Johnson requested I meet her at the “Piercing Pagoda” in her local strip mall. It was here that Brooke introduced me to her already-pierced mother, Nadine Johnson. It was clear from the golden hoops in Nadine’s ears that this wasn’t just a simple case of peer pressure; Brooke’s home environment was clearly volatile and unhealthy.

                I felt bile begin to rise in my throat as Nadine explained to me that she, “[has] an entire collection of antique jewelry that’s been handed down from one generation to another in [her] family, and [she] cannot wait to pass the earrings along to Brooke.” Brooke responded by nodding her head, clearly putting on a show to ensure her mother’s approval and love. I knew that, below her calm surface, Brooke was filled with the deep, festering self-loathing that lives within every young woman. No female is born with the desire to modify her body—this is something we are taught by society, something that is learned. Though it took every ounce of self-restraint within me to refrain from spitting in Nadine Johnson’s face, I had to accept the depressing fact that this was merely a delusion she had received—much like the jewelry— from her mother.

                “You have a choice,” I told Miss Johnson, attempting to reach out and offer her a light at the end of the tunnel. “You have free will, and the decision to disfigure your body is ultimately yours. Some children are not so lucky.” When I went on to explain to Brooke that some infants have their ears pierced against their will, Nadine interjected. “That way they don’t remember the pain. I wish I’d just done that with you, Brooke.” I continued to explain to Nadine that I could douse my infant in gasoline and light her on fire and she probably wouldn’t remember the pain of that event either, to which Nadine responded, “Wha…What are you…That’s not even…I mean—what?” Poor little Brooke has clearly been raised by an inarticulate, idiotic buffoon who is masquerading as a woman.

                I regret to report that my conversation with Brooke that day had little impact on the girl’s life. As her mother took her hand, leading her to the piercing chair inside of this so-called “pagoda” (which looked nothing like an actual pagoda, and seemed like an unapologetically racist moniker—but that’s another blog post altogether), I screamed in anguish from the adjacent food court. “You don’t have to do this!” I cried, holding back tears. “It may boost your confidence and stop children from teasing you for a short period of time, but will you love yourself more in the long run? Love yourself for who you are, Brooke! Love your ears, no matter what’s hanging from them!”

                The morbidly obese she-monster behind the food court McDonald’s register stared daggers at me as I sobbed into my low-fat fruit ‘n yogurt parfait that afternoon. “Forgive me for mourning the loss of a child’s innocence!” I yelled. Her icy silence prompted me to impress upon her the seriousness of the situation. “You just don’t understand what it’s like the be objectified, that’s all. I mean—what man would ever look at you like a piece of meat? So I guess it’s difficult for you to identify, but try to have some empathy! There is a little girl who is modifying her body today because our patriarchal society told her it was attractive.” As I spoke these words, Brooke and Nadine Johnson exited the Piercing Pagoda, hand-in-hand. I hung my head in defeat.

                Though all hope may be lost for Brooke Johnson, it’s not too late to protect other little girls from a similar fate. It is up to us to change society’s perception of beauty by prescribing our own ideals. It is up to us to show the world that being beautiful on the inside is all that matters. I know it’s difficult to remember that we, as women, are more than our physical bodies. Especially when every other news article or blog post we read concerns how concerned we are about our bodies. Kind of like if I tell you, “You don’t have to think about pink horses,” and then all you can think about are pink horses. Despite this, please try to remember we’re more than our physical bodies. Women are more than their bodies. We are more. We are so many more adjectives and capable of so many verbs, and possessing so many…things. Not just beautiful bodies.

              And if you have a beautiful body…you should be ashamed of it because, by acknowledging your beauty, you are objectifying yourself.  

[waitwaitwaitokay]

"Odds and Ends"

I haven't created a piece of artwork for fun for nearly a year now. While I was at Roundabout, things were so busy. When I was at Broadway World, the only thing I was inspired to do after 9 hours of urgent ad trafficking was to shut my brain off, make dinner, watch some "Project Runway," and call it a night. However, on the night before my last day at BWW, inspiration struck. I picked up my pencil and paint brush and made that thing that's sitting above this paragraph. It was such a cathartic experience. 

I was lucky that inspiration to create something hit while I was at home. Normally it won't. Especially when it's a writing idea. Typically, it strikes on the subway, or when I'm walking around the neighborhood, or waiting in line at the grocery store, or the minute after my lunch break ends at work.

Some people like to keep notebooks. As a defiant member of the 21st century, I insist on keeping virtual notes on my iPod. I have a little section on the Notepad app that is descriptively labeled "Odds and Ends." It contains all sorts of tidbits. Sometimes it's an idea for an entire play, sometimes it's snippets of dialogue, or a one-liner. Sometimes it's just a weird, abstract idea. Some entries are made while not-sober, and those are often the least useful (yet most entertaining) entries.

It's a very personal list that I've never shared with anyone before. There are certainly some items that I intend to use in the near future, but there are other scrawlings that may never find a home. So now, for the sake of giving these words a life outside of my iPod, I'd like to share a few entries with you. 

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"Win big or go home."  I think this cynical slogan came to mind after I spotted a NY lottery ad in the subway car. 

"My body creaks like old Victorian architecture."  Fun fact: I am actually 90 years old. 

"I saw you today on Amsterdam, but you had in headphones. I saw you on the subway platform, but you couldn't hear me over the moving trains. I saw you today as I was walking home from school, but you were inside and I was outside."  This was a seed of an idea for a play. It wound up going in a totally different direction, but the general idea was: young, stupid, mostly unrequited love. 

"Purple people train say: 'Buy buy. Spend spend. Pretty war pretty pretty'."  This is a verbatim quote from one of the more bizarre dreams I've experienced. It entailed a human-centipede-like creature (the "Purple People Train" as I've labeled it above) chanting the aforementioned. Oh, liberal fever dreams... 

"You smile like you're sorry to exist."  Just a little observation of what happens whenever someone points a camera at me. Think there's some truth there.  

 "Our souls are on a scavenger hunt for every human emotion."  #RealDeepMan. But, truly, kind of a personal philosophy. Life is about experience. 

"Never try to outrun history. It's tied round your waist, it's anchoring you, for better or worse. It may not keep you from moving, but it will always be a weight you carry."  Shelved dialogue snippet from I Am Not I. 

 "Easy listening? ...Listening should never be easy."  Trying my hand at #DadJokes. 

 "Play: goth spends day at the beach."  Not much of an arc here; sort of lacking in dramatic action. I just thought it would be a funny scene to explore. I guess the antagonist would be the sun...? 

[waitwaitwaitokay]

New Monologue from a New Play!

I've begun sketching out my new play. I've got a general idea of the structure and have started writing a few scenes. The general idea is this: William Inge and Tennessee Williams confront one another in the afterlife after Williams dies in the Hotel Elysee and finds that Inge has been waiting for him. When two modern-day young women rent the Tennessee Williams Suite as a novelty, the dead playwrights decide to manipulate them in order to collaborate on a new piece in the afterlife. Of course the two girls are eerie parallels to the men. One of them has resolved to move from her Midwestern hometown to join the other in New York. Below is a monologue in which she explains the necessity of leaving her job and her old life to start anew. So here it is...the first sneak-peak at this play! (Working title is: "Tennessee Williams and William Inge Write a Play Together. In the Afterlife.") 

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HELENA. It’s the definition of terrifying. Every morning I wake up in the grip of anxiety. It’s six forty-one and I have exactly nineteen minutes to stew in the ever-growing list of things that I need to accomplish at work today or the entire office will burn down in flames. All I want to do is lie there and hear the birds outside and look at the light begin to trickle in—but I am absolutely deafened by the anxious thoughts. I hit my alarm before it goes off. Suddenly I’m in the shower and I can feel the water pounding against my back but, when I close my eyes for a moment, I nearly forget where I am. Nearly. Then they open again. They open to me pouring the last bit of coffee into my travel mug as I slip on my shoes. When I go to grab my keys, they’re still sitting on the dining room table—right where I threw them when I got home from work last Friday. Now I’m in the car, stuck in traffic. I tune in to every single radio station and then decide to leave it on the top forties so I can pretend that nothing’s happening in Syria. Miley Cyrus belts about partying until I cut her off mid-sentence in the office parking lot. I avoid eye contact with everyone in the room as we all mumble our half-asleep “hello”s and I log on—and that music. That Windows startup music. Oh, god, it’s like the soundtrack of a nightmare. I keep pressing keys—the letters are wearing away. Two hours vanish into the void. I need to stretch my legs. I need to get more coffee. So I head down to the kitchen. I know that Joyce will be turning down the hall at exactly the same time, coming from the opposite direction, because, after all, it’s exactly eleven fourteen. I can hear her heels hitting the linoleum with the trepidation of a horse clopping its way to the glue factory. She beats me into the kitchen and heads straight for the coffee pot. Then, with a voice like—like a used car struggling to start in winter—she says, “Happy Monday. It’ll be Friday soon.” And the worst part isn’t even that she always spills a little of the coffee and never cleans it up and I always wind up cleaning it up. The worst part—really, the absolute worst part—is that she’s right. 

[waitwaitwaitokay]

I'm Writing a Play About Tennessee Williams and William Inge Writing a Play Together. In the Afterlife.

What I meant to write about is in bold below. Had to stop, because I am tired and my brain can no longer brain. This is To Be Continued...

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I think the biggest reason I haven’t really used this blog regularly for the past year is that anything interesting I’ve had to say is something I shouldn’t say on the interwebs. The theatre industry is incredibly, insanely, ridiculously small. Everyone knows everyone. Everyone sees everyone, all of the time, everywhere. Any amusing anecdotes that might make perfect fodder for a humorous blog post have been cultivated in confidential marketing meetings. Any personal entries brimming with passionately negative sentiment could guarantee that I never find a job in New York again ever.

I used to use social media a lot in college. Then I started working in digital marketing and advertising. I think the public’s reaction to the NSA monitoring their phone calls’ meta data is adorable. People have no idea how closely they’re being monitored. My intention isn’t to write a “Big Brother is watching you” blog post right now, but—He is. When you nonchalantly send your desire for a ham sandwich into the ever-expanding Twitterverse, He will see. He will try to sell you that sandwich. Until you buy one from Him.

I suppose, in past posts, I did touch a little bit on the various celebrity encounters I’ve had. But even I’m getting bored of listening to myself attempt to impress friends and family in Vermont with stories about getting better seats at the theatre than Nicole Kidman. Or going on crazy elevator adventures with Richard Kind. Or seeing Victor Garber in so many places that you start to feel vaguely stalked… Meh. The most meaningful of these encounters have been with people whose talent and mastery of craft I greatly respect and admire—and these people aren’t household names. No one wants to hear those stories, and I don’t really need to put them into words. They’re simply lovely memories.

Memories. Now we’re closer to where I really wanted to begin: Tennessee Williams. As the dying Mrs. Goforth (very subtly named) says in The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore: “It’s really all memory…except for each passing moment. What I just said to you is a memory now—recollection… Shooting star: it’s shot: --a memory now…”  

Tennessee Williams and William Inge have been haunting me for nearly half a year now. However, their spectral presence has been felt most intensely this summer. Not literally, of course. I just cannot stop reading about them, reading their work, speculating about the dynamics of their relationship, or brainstorming and writing a play about them confronting one another in the afterlife. (I say they’re not literally haunting me, but…that’s actually up for debate if you’re inclined to believe in dream visitations.) They both fascinate me—especially Inge. I identify so much with him. I think he actually interests me more than his writing does. He was the quintessential Midwestern playwright of the 1950s, and his plays are so completely littered with words like “gee” and “shucks” that you can’t help but picture everyone in poodle skirts, chewing on pieces of hay. (Okay, I’m exaggerating a little bit…)  

He was a lost soul coming of age in an economically depressed America. He almost couldn’t finish college because money was tight. He had to move back in with his parents after school. He bounced around from job to job. He tried his hand at everything from Radio Announcer to Construction Worker. He had social anxieties and the kind of crippling self-loathing that only artistic validation could momentarily quiet. These things disrupted his life greatly, to the mystification of all those around him. His mental and emotional instability might have stemmed from possible sexual abuse (a shaky citation on this one, and my own deduction of the situation. His biographer talks about this particular story as evidence for Inge’s clear and total homosexuality. That shit seemed pretty non-consensual to me and, therefore, less of a reflection on Inge’s orientation.) His doctor was the one that suggested he try alcohol to calm his nerves. So he did. He tried it a lot. When he moved to St. Louis to become a reporter, was finally away from his family, and living in the big city (well, a city, anyway) he really tested the limits of this habit.

I think that meeting Tennessee Williams saved his life. I feel that, if he hadn’t had Williams to tell him, “You should write plays if that’s what you want to do,” he wouldn’t have. If Inge hadn’t been so inspired by The Glass Menagerie, he wouldn’t have written The Dark at the Top of the Stairs. Thanks to Williams sending Audrey Wood his writing, the two playwrights eventually shared the same agent. I’m reading Richard Voss’ biography of Inge right now and I skipped to the index to see where Tennessee is mentioned—and he’s all over the place. His name has the largest list of page numbers compared to anything else in that index.

Tennessee Williams mentions Inge three times in his memoirs. He mentions an unpleasant conversation they once had over lunch. He mentions the time that Inge tried to have him put into a mental hospital. (Allegedly. I try to take everything Williams writes with a grain of salt—he does prefer fantasy to reality.) Finally, he writes about Inge’s suicide. He’s not completely detached from the subject, but you can tell that Williams didn’t feel especially close to Inge. Inge was just as much of a mystery to him as he was to nearly everyone else in his life—and Williams fully admits that.

Williams had intense phases of jealousy over Inge’s success in the ‘50s. Seeing your protégée have hit after hit on Broadway, while your own work gets panned by the critics, was probably not the greatest feeling in the world. So I think that was one of the reasons Williams became so detached. Biggest, saddest irony ever: greatest American playwright in history is jealous of a man no one remembers. Inge had nothing but admiration for Williams; he idolized him. He wrote little homages to Williams in his plays. Tennessee Williams was a total rock star in his eyes.

My ramblings about Wlliams and Inge = Definitely to be continued…

But it is now 1:15 on a Thursday night, and I am a tired fool who has no life and needs to work tomorrow. So…peace.  

[waitwaitwaitokay]

How Did This Happen?

(An entire town is in ruins. Mayor and Clerk stand in rubble.) MAYOR. ...And you're telling me a slight breeze did THIS? I demand to know why! CLERK. It was bound to happen, Mr. Mayor. After all, we built this city...we built this city on rock and roll.

[waitwaitwaitokay]

Wish I Were Human

(Two cats lay on the carpet, half-asleep, bathed in the midday sun.) FIFI. Wish I were a human. FLUFFY. Right? FIFI. They, like, only sleep 6 hours a day. FLUFFY. So efficient. FIFI. They go out and do things. FLUFFY. Their lives are so fulfilling.

[waitwaitwaitokay]

Prettiest Little Girl

(Sandra holds a newborn as Ryan looks on lovingly.)   SANDRA. She's so beautiful.   RYAN. She's perfect. Prettiest little girl in the ward.   (Silence.) SANDRA. How long do you think it will take them to notice she's gone RYAN. Let's leave--now.  (Blackout.)

[waitwaitwaitokay]

Jam and Jesus on Toast

(Lee, Eva, Jo and Liz sit at a table, eating.)

LEE. Jesus Christ.

(The face of Jesus is on Lee’s toast.)

EVA. It’s a miracle. JO. Optical illusion--Instagram it. LIZ. Sell it on eBay. EVA. Put it behind glass!  

(Silence.) (Lee eats the toast.)

[waitwaitwaitokay]

Falling

(A and B are suspended in the air, mid-fall.) 

A. Why did you jump? B. I thought the world was ending. You? A. Impulse. B. (Pause.) In hindsight-- A. Too late. B. What do we do now? A. Keep falling. B. And then? A. Find solid ground.

(Blackout.)

[waitwaitwaitokay]

31 Plays in 31 Days

There's a playwriting group out in California that does an annual "31 Plays in 31 Days" event-type-thing. I stumbled upon them via Facebook and thought--heck, why not join in the fun? Always good to flex the writing muscles. And mine are sorely out of shape presently. So here I am, currently warming up with all of the other participating writers. The warm-up during the last week of July consists of writing a play each day that is 256 characters or less (not characters in the play, but letters and punctuation and whatnot.) We started yesterday and, so far, I've been having a lot of fun with it. August 1st marks the start--this is merely a preliminary exercise. Starting in August there are no character limits. I thought it would also be a good idea to dust the cobwebs off of this blog and post the plays I write here.  

I've been reading the other submissions (everything is monitored via App.net. My account is over here.) There's some really great stuff on there. But I think most have the impulse to capture small moments, given the character restrictions. Bite-size vignettes that establish relationship more than theme or plot. I don't know why, but my mind immediately leaps to the biggest ideas possible. I want to attempt to condense enormously broad ideas into 256 characters--it's an excuse to leap into the world of the absurd. And I will take any excuse I can get. Maybe I'll try reigning it in for the next one and not going overboard so much. We'll see.

Alright, cool stuff. So I'll post each play as its own...post. God, I'm such a freaking wordsmith, look at me go with all these...words and...things. Yeah, man. Peace. 

[waitwaitwaitokay]

Life is never lived alone.

When I started this blog, I intended it to be an outlet for exercising my writing ability. My main goal was to entertain people and get some laughs out of the friends who were bored enough to glance over these posts. I'd like to take a moment now to get sappy and depart from structure and relieve myself of the pressure to make you laugh--Guys, I can't find the password to my livejournal from high school, so this blog will have to do. 

Today was my last day as the Digital Marketing Apprentice at Roundabout Theatre Company. My supervisor, Mark, conceded he's "not good with 'goodbyes'." I'm not either. I'm really not good with them. I've had far too many "goodbyes"--it's a major motif in my life that I can't seem to get rid of. For example, I got incredibly close to a girl in my Acting I class freshman year of college. I finally felt like I found someone who was on the same wavelength. We walked around campus and chatted until 5:00AM the night (through morning) before final exams--we only parted ways because we kept getting kicked out of buildings that were closing. Of course, she was transferring schools the second finals ended. This is only one example of many--if I dive further into this topic, this blog post will never end. The point is: Part of why I'm so quiet and shy, I think, is kind of an underlying sense that all things and relationships are transitory. I try to resist getting too attached, but wind up doing so anyway, then get irrationally depressed when I'm forced to say "goodbye" to anyone. Even if it's temporary, a deep part of my subconscious paints every wave of the hand with a tinge of finality.  

Before I came to Roundabout, during 2011-2012, I was in a pretty dark place. What really got the ball rolling was finding out my best friend and housemate was suicidal; she dropped out of school three months shy of our graduation. That big, dark house of ours somehow got even bigger and darker. I didn't know how to finish 4 years without her--we'd gone through it all together. So I decided to distract myself with, y'know, the usual stuff--not getting schoolwork done, substance abuse, parties, whatever. I nearly missed my own graduation--I was physically there, but my mind was somewhere else entirely.

So I graduated and, with little savings and a mountain of student loan debt, I moved back in with my parents and started working at Lane Bryant. Everything there is a push to open credit accounts. My manager was a pill-popping bitch who treated me like shit. But whenever life throws you bitches, it throws you angels too. My immediate supervisor, after hearing the manager brag about treating me terribly, looked me in the eye and said, "Laura, no one deserves to be treated like that. NEVER let anyone treat you that way--co-worker, family member, friend, boss--NO ONE. You deserve to be respected." I nodded quietly, took a bin full of sensor tags into the stock room, cried for a moment, then wiped the tears away and walked back onto the sales floor like nothing happened. 

After Lane Bryant, I started working in a grocery store deli in my hometown where I sliced meat and cheese for all of my high school acquaintances and their mothers. One particularly callous mother saw me and said, "Wait--what did you study in school again?" "Theatre." "And you're working here?!" She asked rhetorically, literally throwing back her head to laugh at me. I receded deep within myself as I skewered chicken carcasses for the rotisserie, stared into the murky water as I scraped coleslaw off dishes, and developed mild frostbite as I shoved product around in walk-in freezers. I would arrive at 10 AM and then be asked to stay and close the store at 10 PM. Sometimes I would open at 5:30 AM and close. I rarely saw my parents or brother and I lived with them. I never saw my friends. My body was in constant pain from being on my feet all day and all of the heavy lifting. In fact, my back is still majorly fucked up from that job. I would drink myself to sleep every night and hide the vodka bottles in my closet. No one knew until my mother and brother took me to the emergency room because I was having severe chest pain one evening--the nurse asked about alcohol while they were in the room and, afraid for my life, I answered honestly. The problem was musculoskeletal and the doctor told me the only way to solve the problem was to stop doing whatever work had caused it in the first place. Which meant, of course, finally leaving Hannaford's deli, even though I had no job lined up and monthly loan payments to make.

The only redeeming part of that job was that I never had to suffer alone. Every person I worked with was incredible. The obstacles they've faced and overcome, the stories they would tell, the sense of camaraderie that enveloped us as we faced the storm of Saturday afternoon shoppers. Working together on holidays, away from our families. We faced everything together. And I was sad to say "goodbye" to each of them.  

I then took on a temporary seasonal internship at Vermont Business Magazine doing mostly cold calls to business owners. It was a nice work environment, with lovely people, though things could easily get tedious while reading from a script all day long. I applied to theatre jobs all around the country, hoping to get a bite somewhere. No luck. My supervisor was a constant support and encouraged me to, "Never give up on your dreams." It made me feel like I was in a really cheesy Lifetime movie, but that was her constant mantra. "Always follow your dreams."

My internship wound down and, through college friends, I managed to get a first-round interview with Roundabout. Then all was quiet. I was so sick of applying to jobs and not hearing back--to have made it a step further and face the same process was breaking my heart. Actually, that was around the time I made the first entry to this blog. It was a cynical, depressed post about how I was basically over life and just wanted to melt into the ether. 

In addition to everything else, our house faced a horrible flea infestation that summer. The bites covering my body were like a cruel metaphor. I went to bed that evening feeling incredibly depressed. I woke up and a storm was raging outside. The streets of Milton, Vermont were facing flash floods. There was a tornado warning. We lost tiles off of our roof. And then, that afternoon, as the winds died down and rain began to only calmly sprinkle...I got an email. It was from Mark Cajigao. And he wanted to know if I could come in for a second interview at Roundabout's New York office either "tomorrow, Thursday or Friday?" I immediately booked my train tickets and hotel room with what I had left in my savings and thought, "Fuck it. This is it. Go big or go home." 

I tossed and turned in my hotel bed the night before my interview. The air conditioner screamed and coughed throughout the night, the starchy sheets rubbing against my bite-covered flesh. The thoughts, "What are you doing here? What makes you think you deserve to be here? You just blew a shit ton of money to take a trip to New York and get rejected in-person, what is wrong with you?" rotating through my mind, stuck on repeat until the morning. 

I got up. I showered. I stared at my red, torn-up legs in the full-length hotel mirror. I dressed. Took a deep breath. And saw that I had a missed call on my phone. I listened to my voice mail. 

"Hi, it's Maggie....I would wish you luck, but you don't need it...You are going to dazzle them...Everyone believes in you--you just need to believe in yourself the way we all believe in you..." 

I sat in a deli on 8th Ave listening to that voice message over and over. The self-hatred began to dissipate enough to realize Maggie was right. Everyone in my life has been and is so incredibly supportive. Everyone I know and love is cheering me on while I insist I can't even take the first step in the race. And not only was I doing myself a disservice in standing still--I was insulting every loved one. I took thoughts of Maggie with me. I took thoughts of Lane Bryant and Hannaford's and everyone there. I took Teresa's mantra to "Follow your dreams." I took my family, my friends from Vermont, my friends from Ithaca. Everyone. They were all with me in that interview, and they have been ever since. Not a day goes by when I don't remember what I've been through and who's been through it with me. I know what it's like to want to give up, and holding onto that feeling has framed every experience in New York. It's a tough city, but no crowded subway car can compete with the desperation of driving down a road that leads to nowhere. 

I sat down with the intention of writing about Roundabout and my time there. But, truth is, I really needed to explain myself and tell the story of WHY I wrote cards to everyone I worked with in Marketing and was crying on the subway home tonight. Why this experience has meant so much to me. It's because Roundabout was the rainbow after the storm. It was the gateway to my career and my life. For the first time in my working life, instead of busting my ass and getting laughed at and treated like shit--I did the easiest things in the world and never heard the end of the praise for doing so. Mark and everyone in Marketing--and the entire company--treated me better than I've ever been treated. And it's hard to feel, even now, that I deserved it. I made the most amazing friends. I went through a program with amazing talented theatre up-and-comers. I met my angel of a roommate, Mara, who has done nothing but bring light into my life. I met my partner in crime, Maureen, who I can't imagine exploring the city without. 

And now I'm sitting here sobbing harder than I have in an entire year. But they're happy tears. I'm so grateful and humbled for the experience--but predominantly for the people I've met along the way. 

Life can be shit. Life can be incredible. But life is never lived alone.