A Simple Choice

--  Let's try something a little less sweet --

"A Simple Choice"

They told me that if I got rid of Elyse

That I could get the cover

They said they couldn't sell me

Not on the cover, anyway

Not being on the cover

Like right there, you know?

Not if I had Elyse

Because, like

Teenage girls

They hear you're married

And it's like, okay

Kill the fantasy, you know?

Because even though

There's no way

I would get with a teenage girl

Not even a really hot one

I really can't even begin to pretend

That I could get with EVERY teenage girl

So the only obvious solution

Is to sort of remain chaste

And act like I never have sex

Or do anything wrong

And I mean, I never did have sex

Until I got married

Because I believe in the power

Of matrimonial unions

But when they told me

That I would have to get rid of Elyse

It seemed like such a simple choice

You know what I mean?

I had to choose Elyse

If it were a movie

Everybody in the audience

Would be yelling at me

CHOOSE ELYSE!

So that's what I did

Because that's how I gauge my decisions

I pretend I'm in a movie

And then I do what the hero would do

Because, like, he's the hero

So I chose Elyse

And that was, like, three years ago

And um, I guess looking back

It wasn't, really...

The best decision

Because, I mean, if I had gotten the cover

I would have been famous

And I mean, I would have missed Elyse

But I would have been missing her

And famous

Now, she's a total bitch

And I can't stand her

And I want a divorce

And I'm pretty sure I like boys

And I'm not even famous

So I mean, what the what, you know?

Simple choice?

Not so much

You know?

I guess I've been watching the wrong movies

I need to watch more complicated movies or something

Like, independent movies

Where people do bad things

Like leave their bitches

So they can be famous

And have mad sex with other gay famous people

Who might be more prone

To doing it with guys who can be discreet

You know?

It's just like--

I would have missed her

But I would have had money

I would have had a hit single

I would have been on the COVER

And that stuff never goes away

Fame?

Yeah, it goes away

But money doesn't

As long as you're not stupid

And watch how much coke you do

You know, budget yourself

But wives?  They go away

They go away before they even leave

And you're laying in bed

Hard cause you just watched The Soup

And Joel McHale...God, you know?

And she's laying there

And you're like--

I could have been on TEEN FUCKING MAGAZINE

IF NOT FOR YOU, YOU DUMB BITCH

And that would have been FOREVER

FOREVER, you know?

But I chose her

I gambled

I gambled on love

And I lost

Man, did I lose

Like, hardcore

It was a simple choice

It was such an easy choice

When you think about it

And I just chose wrong

That's all there is to it

As Long As I Get My Sunset

I smell like ocean

Which isn't bad

I guess, in the grand scheme

The grand scheme of things

As they say

I have sand

All over me

And it tickles

But it's not unpleasant

I'm in a cave

And the water's coming in

And I have no way to get out

So I suppose I should worry

But I just can't

I don't care about what happens

As long as I get my sunset

I can't see the palm trees anymore

I can't see the island

I can't see civilization

But I'll see my sunset

That's the one thing you can't miss

I don't even know

If there's a world out there anymore

I heard explosions

And I woke up in a cave

And I don't remember

How I got here

Or what it is that I wanted

Or why I'm wearing nothing

But an AC/DC t-shirt

From the last tour

And Bermuda shorts

But I'm assuming

Or I have to assume

That I'm a tourist

Or a crazy person

Or both

But I don't care about any of that

As long as I get my sunset

I know that I don't think

I'm much to look at

And it seems silly

To think of something

That shallow

When you're about to die

But I really wish

I could have at least

Lived one day on this earth

As a beautiful person

That must be something

That really must be something

I wish I could have been that sunset

I wish that in the next life

If there's a life to come back to

A world left to live in

I wish to come back as that

As a beautiful thing

That emerges everyday

And gives a little bit of something

To everyone who sees it

That reminds them

They still have time

Unless they don't

Unless they're like me

And even then, they'll go--

At least I got a sunset

I got a lot of sunsets

A lifetime of sunsets

There's a three-piece suit

Right over there, near the cave paintings

And I don't know if it's mine

But I think I'll put it on

And wade into the water

Why wait for it to come to me?

I feel like I've been waiting

Waiting for things my whole life

And maybe this time

I need to go towards something

Instead of waiting for it

To crawl up onto my toes

And slide over me

Be so passive about life

Be so inactive in it

Be so sad about everything

Who says death has to be sad?

Maybe it's sad because we let it crawl onto us

Rather than take it up into our hands

And let it rain down upon us

I'm not talking suicide

But since it's inevitable

Why not fight it

By going right at it

By looking up into it

And seeing if you can breathe it in

And keep breathing

Right up until the end

I'm not scared of death

I'm just afraid of that sunset

I'm afraid it won't come soon enough

The cave paintings are unusual

They show a whole world of happy people

People who have nothing

People who are impressed by fire

People who thought the world

Was made for them to play in

Isn't that fantastic?

They had fire and woolly mammoths

And that was all they needed

And if they needed more

They had sunsets, didn't they?

Maybe the same ones

That I've had all my life

Who knows?

Maybe I wasn't so bad to look at

I can't check now

Because I don't have a mirror

Just the water to look down into

And who knows

How honest

The reflection will be

Or the person

It's reflecting

I once heard a story

About a man

Who could make you look at yourself

And other people

As if it was the first time

You were ever seeing them

Or yourself

I wondered what I'd look like

If I would like what I'd see

If maybe I'd go easier on myself

If it would be bearable

. . . . .

There it is

There's that last one

The last one I'll get

Before the water comes

There's peace

I didn't know I'd get it

I didn't know for sure

But I got it, I did

I got my peace

I said it, and I had it

And now I can go

Now it's okay

I said I'd go happily

And I'm a man of my word

And I got a three-piece suit, too

And I got a cave painting

And I got cool air

And I got a sea breeze

And the smell of the ocean

And warm sand on my skin

And the certainty

That the palm trees

And the island

And the resorts

Are all out there somewhere

That I could get back to them

If I didn't already promise

That all I wanted

Was one last day to end

With me still breathing

And I got it

So how can you not be happy?

Really, how can you not?

When you get exactly

What you wanted

I just kept saying--

I kept saying it

Over and over

As long as I got my sunset

Then everything will be all right

And you know what?

I was right

I was wrong about a lot of things

But this time

I was right

Buy Yourself Flowers

You want flowers?

Flowers?

From a man?

That's what you want

Because I can buy you flowers

Oh, I can buy you a bouquet

A big one with roses

With whatever you want

If that's what you want

But I'm not a man

So you don't want those flowers

Do you, honey?

Do you?

Do you want flowers from Roy?

Roy don't like you like that either

Oh, he loves you because you're his best friend

But you don't want his flowers

Do you?

I could get everybody in this town

To send you flowers

And you wouldn't care

Because you wouldn't be getting flowers

From the moron you want flowers from

Would you, honey?

Roy, turn down the music

I'm trying to talk to Lulu

And she's not listening as it is

She wants flowers

Like it'll prove something

Like she can cart her flowers around

Take 'em to the houses

Of all the other girls

Competing for that moron

Going--

Look at my flowers!

LOOK AT MY FLOWERS!

I have flowers from HIM!

That means something!

And it doesn't mean SHIT

Flowers grow all over the place

He can pour out that shit of his

And flowers can spring up from it

And those are the flowers you want?

The roses won't even smell like a roses

They'll just smell like bullshit

'Cause that's what they'll grow out of

You want him to come over here

With a bunch of bullshit

That you'll have to put in a vase

And work hard at keeping alive

Like you're working at keeping him

And in the end

You're going to lose it all

Plus me

Plus Roy

Plus yourself

And anything else

That doesn't fit in that vase

Flowers are a losing battle

But you want 'em, huh?

Because you just love

You just LOVE losing battles

Never met someone

Who liked losing

And losers

As much as you, Lulu

I won't talk you out of it

You want flowers

Want him

You want him?

Want him

You want me to go away

I'll take Roy

And we'll be on our way

But let me tell you this

If you want flowers

Honey, you better go get 'em

You better buy yourself flowers

Because the only ones he's sending

He's sending to someone else

Let's go, Roy

For the First Time, All Over Again

--  Since I'm mainly putting together narratives for the next monologue show, I thought I'd try my hand at a fable of sorts.  One of my favorite songs is "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face," and I had to wonder...What would it be like if you could grow unaccustomed to someone's face?  --

"For the First Time, All Over Again"

He came to town

In shabby van

Covered in giant stamps

Like an old-fashioned

Traveler's suitcase

His name was Winchell

And he claimed to do magic

But only a particular kind of magic

A certain skill, a trick, some might say

He claimed

That for fifty-three dollars

And thirty four cents

He could point you at someone

And it could be anyone

And make you see them

For the first time

This could include your wife

This could include your mother

This could include your best friend

This could include anyone

For fifty-three dollars

And thirty-four cents

Jacie was the first to pony up

She wanted to look at her boyfriend

For the first time, all over again

See Trent again

And see why

She fell in love with him

But once she handed over her money

And Winchell put his hand on her head

With a light touch, a simple tap

Something strange happened

Jacie looked at Trent

And she felt fear

She looked at a man

That she didn't like

She saw his cruel eyes

She saw his rough hands

She saw a mouth

That was quick to curse and scream

But slow to smile

Jacie ran off that day

Determined never to come back

She hadn't recalled up to that point

That upon first seeing Trent

She was scared of him

He'd walked over to her

And charmed his way in

Assuaging her fears

Making her think that she was a fool

Dulling her instincts

Silencing her alarms

But when she saw him again

For the first time

She knew she had to go

Before he could charm her again

Muriel was next

She didn't believe in magic

But she believed Jacie

When the girl said she wasn't coming back

And didn't when the sun rose

And Trent found himself

In an empty bed

With his hands tied to the bedposts

And nobody offering to untie them

Muriel had been married to Stokes

For thirty-seven years

And she was fed up with him

He burped at every possible opportunity

And he slopped up sauce with his bread

Two things Muriel had seen her father do

And two things she always said

She would never put up with

When she was married

Somehow the rules had dissipated

And there was Stokes at the breakfast table

Taking toast and dipping it in the egg yolk

Making a dirty plate dirtier

And clean all at the same time

She was considering leaving him

And if Jacie could leave Trent

Tie up that sociopath

And head for Fresno

Then Hell, Muriel could go too

Because Stokes was disgusting

But he sure wasn't dangerous

She gave Winchell her money

And he tapped his foot twice

Then she went home

And saw her husband

For the first time, all over again

His laugh lines showed

His bad teeth

His bad breath

The cigarette stains

The scar on the side of his face

The birthmark shaped like a pumpkin

The bad leg

She didn't see history

She didn't see the past

She didn't see their kids

Or that he'd been faithful

Or that he'd been loving

Or that he'd been understanding

She didn't see that he stuck with her

When she found out about the cancer

She didn't see that he once carried her for two miles

When their car broken down outside town

She didn't see that he knew the spots on her back

To kiss, lightly, and put her right in the mood

All she saw

Was this man

Sitting at a table

Eating like a slob

Looking so damn good

She climbed into his lap

And gave him the best kiss

She'd given him in years

And Stokes leaned back

Laughed at her

And said--

'You went to see Winchell, didn't you?'

Tobey LaGrange went on a Friday

He went on his day off

But he didn't want to see anyone

He wanted them to see him

Jen Jen was his best friend

But he was so hopelessly in love with her

That being around her had become painful

To the point of impossible

He was convinced that she could have loved him

If instead of telling her a joke when they first met

He had done something cool

Like light a cigarette

Or sulk in a corner

He paid Winchell money

And informed him

That Jen Jen was working at the cafe

In the heart of town

And could he please go there

And make her see Tobey

For the first time, all over again

This time he wouldn't foul it up

An hour later, he went to the cafe

And stood in front of Jen Jen

Determined not to look funny

Or do anything

To ruin his second first chance

She smiled at him, said--

'Hey Tobey'

--And asked him--

'Want a latte?'

He was hurt

She didn't love him

And he'd worn sunglasses

Expensive sunglasses

And a shirt

That he thought

Made him look rugged

'Don't I look different?'

She tilted her head a little

Then took off her apron

Put it down on the counter

And came around

So she could stand in front of him

She took a second

Then said--

'You look as stupid as the day I met you.'

Then she kissed him

Tapped his lips

With her finger

In a sweet sort of way

And said--

'I forgot how stupid you looked.'

Then she went back to work

And Tobey stood there

Wondering what to do next

More confused than ever

Linda was the next to try

She wanted to have Winchell

Do his magic on her

So she could see her daughter

She wanted to see where she went wrong

Where the holes were

Where the flaws showed themselves

Where the cracks appeared on the surface

Because Linda was going to find them

Go over them

And fix them once and for all

She couldn't see her daughter anymore

All she could see was a pile of sorrow

And there was no way

She could dig through all of that

Into the heart of the problem

She couldn't take a step back

And see where the string started

So she could pull it back

Back to her

Tie it up around her wrists

And her waists

Take it back onto herself

And heal her little girl

Winchell handed her

A handful of sand

And made her

Open her hand

And let it all go

Then he sent her home

Where she found her daughter

Lying in bed

Spread out on the comforter

Breathing in and out

Taking the simplest thing in the world

Into her body

Rest

Linda sat down on that bed

And cried on her little girl

Because she was so beautiful

Because she was so pure

Because she was hurting

But in that hurt

There was a need

That Linda refused to fill

A messy room

She couldn't clean

Because she was overwhelmed

By the fact

That she couldn't see

The floor from the flaws

She ran her fingers

Up and down

Her little girl's back

And she didn't see the stealing

And she didn't see the violence

And she didn't see the nasty boyfriends

She saw Katie

For the first time, all over again

And she wanted to try again

God, how she wanted to try again

The last person to see Winchell

Was Margaret McBride

And she asked to see Winchell

See him for the first time, all over again

All he did

Was hold up a mirror

And Margaret saw

She saw it all

Meaning nothing

But a new nothing

A first-time nothing

She turned to Winchell

And gave him her hand

'I told myself you weren't as handsome as I remembered.'

She'd been telling herself that

Ever since she sent him away

Claiming in her head

That a man who sold mirrors

Couldn't support her

Or be a good provider

For a family

Then she got into that van

With the stamps all over it

And Winchell drove away

Having gotten what he came for

And he left a town

Full of people

Who kept looking at each other

Wondering if they could do it without him

Wondering if they could see themselves

For the first time, all over again

I Never Have to Like You Again

You know, at first

I didn't see the upside

Here I am

Five years into a job

And the company dissolves

I thought to myself

There cannot possibly be

An upside to this

There just can't be

But then it occurred to me, Marty

I never have to like you again

I never even have to pretend to

I can hate your guts

All I want

And nobody can stop me

Nobody can tell me

That I have to put it aside

So that we can have

A positive working relationship

We don't need to have

Any kind of relationship

We don't even need to pretend

That the other person exists

I can leave this office

Right now

And for all I know

You could be hit by a bus

A glorious bus

Driven by angels

I never have to smile at you

Pretending I don't wish you

Covered in burning wax

Like a giant asshole candle

I never have to be at parties with you

And watch with dread

As the room I'm in empties

Inexplicably

So that you and I

Are the only two people left in it

I never have to pretend

That I wouldn't screw your wife

Just to piss you off

I can be a good person now

Isn't that marvelous?

All this time

We've been pretending

That we liked each other

Just because not liking each other

Would be a tad more difficult

We had to laugh together

And make memories together

When all we really wanted to do

Was throw staplers at each other's heads

And send each other viruses via e-mail

I have more memories with you

Than I do with best friends

With siblings, cousins

Co-workers I actually LIKE!

All because I had to make more of an effort

To create good times with you

To cover up the fact

That I wanted to cover you in venomous snakes

But now

I never have to like you again

And do you want to know

What the worst part was?

I questioned

Whether or not

You felt the same way

I wondered if maybe it was just me

I wasn't sure

If maybe I was just nasty

And that you really did like me

And that finding out I hated your guts

Would ultimately destroy

You puny little heart

But then last week

When we heard the news

About the company

I saw that look on your face

It was almost like a smile

As much of a smile you can have

When you learn that you're old

And about to be impoverished

And I knew why you smiled

Because I was smiling too

You were thinking--

Hey, if nothing else

I never have to see that putz again

So here's to you, asshole

May you live long

And live far away from me

Like it or not

Our lives have been tied together

For all this time

And a part of me

Will miss having someone

To throw all my misery into

Not a big part of me

But a part, a small part

A micro--

Well, you get what I'm saying

Now if you'll excuse me

I'm taking my Word-a-Day calendar

And the photos of people I like

And I'm heading out

Good luck

Believe it or not

I mean that

What I Drive

--  This is what happens when you watch "Chinatown" while writing.  --

"What I Drive"

Do you know what I drive, Mr. Berg?

I drive a car paid for by father

A very wealthy man

Who would not be pleased

To hear you speaking to me

The way you have

I drive a car that may have

In its time

Run a few red lights

Run through a stop sign or two

Perhaps even run over a passing pedestrian

Who should have watched out for himself

Or herself

A bit better

That's all to be expected

After all

Cars make mistakes

They're like people that way

Sometimes they go too fast

Sometimes they break down too soon

Sometimes they bump a little too hard

And get dented in the process

But you can't fault them for it

Because really

It's all about who's driving them

I drive my car very carefully, Mr. Berg

But I am a woman driver

We're so careless

We see a young man crossing the street

A rather handsome young man

Who happens to be our husband's tennis coach

And who's happy to give us free lessons

When we ask nicely

And who's also prone to giving lessons

To the wives of other husbands

And when that crosses our mind

Our car might cross onto the sidewalk

And smash into that young tennis coach

And then drive away

As if nothing's happened

Women drivers

You men say

And you're right

We're so flighty

I drive a classic car, Mr. Berg

It's not new and flashy

But it gets me where I need to go

It gets done what I need done

And it does it swiftly

And without fuss

Other things aren't so efficient

Things, and I'm just naming objects here

Things like knives

Things like guns

Rope, blunt objects

Hitmen

Those sorts of things

Are messy

My car is not messy, Mr. Berg

Not at all

I get it washed every Sunday

And on the day my husband's tennis coach

Was struck down

By a car that looked just like mine

It was a Sunday

I gave the car a good scrub on that day

A nice, clean scrub with my own two hands

I'm not a woman

Who's afraid of hard work

Mr. Berg

I'm more than happy

To work hard

When I need my messes

Handled properly

That's why I'm here

To handle my mess

Because I understand my husband hired you

To see if I had anything to do

With Jeffrey's death

And I'm sure you've found out some things

Some things that the police

May have chosen to overlook

When my father

Also a wealthy man

Reminded them who golfs with the mayor

At least once a week

But my husband is pesky

He likes to dig, dig, dig

And I can't have that

So I plan on driving by his work this afternoon

He likes to walk to the local deli

And get pastrami on rye

The sidewalks on that part of town

Are so wide

You could drive right onto them

And not even know it

...I imagine

I can see that folder sitting on your desk

I can see my name on it

I can see that you're wondering

How much I brought with me

To pay you off

But I didn't bring any money

And I don't plan on getting any

All I have is my smile

And my car keys

And the only offer

I'm willing to make you

Is this, Mr. Berg

Would you like to take me

And my car

For a drive?

The Man with Seven Arms

Gina walked across the street

It was 2am and it'd just finished raining

Her feet were killing her

Seven blocks

Seven blocks to meet him

To meet the man with seven arms

She passed the drive-by marriage boutique

Right there on the strip

Where you can make all the bad decisions you like

Her mother used to say

That her father never met a bad decision he didn't like

But she didn't like to hear that

About her father

There was a young man and woman

Standing outside the boutique

Putting whatever they could find in their pockets

On each other's heads

His wallet

Her purse

His car keys

Her bouquet

Gina got to the house ten minutes later

She opened the door and went inside

Wondered if the seven arms were tattoos

If they're code for something

If it's because he dipped his fingers

In all the honey pots he could find

What she didn't expect is what she was promised

A man with seven arms

Shaved head and bad teeth

Photos of himself on a boardwalk

Hung on all the walls

Gina wondered if he was in the circus

And who hangs pictures on walls anymore

Knowing eventually they're going to come down

And then you wind up with holes everywhere

Where there used to be only memories

She took off her jacket

And proceeded to kiss him

But he stopped her

'Just let me hold you,' he said.

So she let him

Because it's his two hundred bucks

And because she was curious

The arms wrapped around her

The first one felt safe

Like her father

When he'd wrap her up in a blanket

And carry her upstairs

The stairs creaking

Under his sturdy weight

And the light way

He'd set her down

Like he was putting her in a pool

Rather than in a bed

Covered with Mickey Mouse

The second arm felt like her brother's

Coarse and hairless

Spots all over it

That couldn't be explained

A sickly looking arm

Joe would sunburn so easily

He'd barely ever go outside

And when she moved to Vegas

She saw how much it hurt him

Knowing he couldn't ever follow after her

But that was the point

The third arm was blue

And Gina couldn't tell what to make of it

It looked like the arm of a Hindu god

There was a pulse underneath it

That didn't match the other pulses

This one had a rhythm

It was faster

It was going so strong

She pushed it against her chest

So that it could go into her heart

To see if she could speed herself up

The fourth arm was broken

It was in a sling

So she was careful not to touch it

The man with the seven arms let his fingers

Delicately slide out of the sling

And go across her cheek

The fifth arm was like her old boyfriend's

A big bicep that stayed big

Even when he wasn't trying to make it that way

There was a name on the arm--

'Julie'

--But Gina didn't ask

It wasn't her job to ask

Her old boyfriend used to ride motorcycles

He'd fix them too

Seemed to like fixing them

More than riding them

And he was sweet

He'd been a sweet guy

Looked like a guy who'd hit a woman

Which just went to show you

It's the guys who smile

That you gotta watch out for

She left him when she moved

And he seemed to understand

But it's cold in Vegas

When you crank up the air conditioner high enough

Like Gina liked to do

She lived in a shithole

But she still had an air conditioner

And as long as she had one

She was damn well gonna use it

And use it well

Anyway

She missed those arms

Those arms and those biceps

That could fix something

Then ride it away

The sixth arm had no hand at the end of it

And that was fair, wasn't it?

Gina was never promised a hand

He wasn't the man with seven hands

Just arms, that was what was promised

And she had seven arms around her

Didn't she?

The war took the hand

She could tell from the wound

It looked like her grandfather's wound

Same damn thing he had

What were the odds?

The man with the seven arms

Was trying to hide that particular arm

But Gina took it anyway

And put it by her waist

As if to say--

'It's okay.  What do you have to be embarrassed about?'

The seventh arm was small

The smallest arm she'd ever seen

Like a kid's arm

And she'd took the hand at the end of it

And held it

Like she would a kid crossing a street

It had freckles

Not spots like the second arm

But just freckles

And it was slightly pink

A great little arm

It was silly

But she almost wanted to ask

Where this guy had gotten that arm from

Because she'd seen it somewhere before

But she couldn't think where

. . . . .

A few hours later

She left the man with seven arms

He'd fallen asleep holding her

And she'd extricated herself from him

Taking the two hundred with her

And closing the door quietly

As she stepped into the hallway

As she passed the boutique

On her way home

She saw the bride

Sitting on the curb

Eyes newly dried

Holding her purse

And her bouquet

Nothing on her head

The groom was nowhere in sight

We're Going Out Tonight

I hit eight red lights on the way here

Eight red lights

Every single light

Between my house and your house

Turned red

As soon as I got near it

But guess what?

We're still going out

Tonight there was a triple feature on--

Breakfast at Tiffany's

An Officer and A Gentleman

And Pretty Woman

Basically

Turner Classic Movies

Begged me to stay home

But guess what?

We're still going out

I broke two nails today

The heel on my favorite shoes came off

My father informed me

That he's marrying a girl

Two years younger than me

But guess what?

We're still going out

I haven't eaten

I am tired

I am decked out

In clothes that smell like chicken nuggets

But we are going out

We're going out tonight

Because we are in our prime

Because our boobs are still perky

Because we don't have boyfriends

Oh please

Your boyfriend's in Michigan

He might as well be invisible

The point is

Just because we have day jobs

And responsibilities

And underlings who report to us

At 7am five days a week

Does NOT mean

That we can't have fun

On a gorgeous night

When we don't have to be up

Early the next day

Remember fun?

Remember when we used to have fun?

Remember when TWO YEARS AGO?

How did we become so boring

In two years?

It takes some people a lifetime

To become boring old women

We've done it

In less time

Than it takes

An elephant to give birth

There should be a baby elephant

Named after our dead social lives

I know I'm just as much to blame as you are

But today I was driving home from work

And I felt something

Something in the air

That feeling

That feeling like it was a good night

Like it could be a good night

You know

When you feel that hum

You drive by restaurants

And you smell great food

And you want to eat it

And not care if it's soaked in fat

When you're not mad

At how bad the roads are

Because it feels like everyone is going somewhere

Going out

Going to a party

Going somewhere you can go too

When you get home

And even your apartment

Your tiny little apartment

That normally welcomes you back

Seems to say--

What are you doing here?

Go out!

That was how I felt tonight

I felt like my life

Was out there

Out in that city

The glowing one

With the lights

The ones we used to dance under

Before we were afraid of getting mugged

We always say that we thought

We were invincible

But do you ever think

That maybe we WERE invincible

BECAUSE we thought we were invincible?

We used to do whatever we wanted

And nothing ever went wrong

Now all I do is what I'm supposed to do

And I wind up with broken heels and a stepmom

Who wants the Jonas Brothers played at her wedding

I don't want to make a fool of myself

I don't want to get arrested

I just want to have fun

I want to dance under the lights again

My whole life

I felt trapped

And neglected

Like there were parties going on

And I couldn't go to them

Because I didn't know where they were

Then I met you

And we became friends

And we became the party

All the parties I ever wanted

Became wherever we were

Then I left the party

And I don't know why

But I don't regret it

I just regret never going back

To see if it was still going on

Maybe that's what I'm scared of

Maybe we're both scared

That we'll go back there

And nobody will remember us

Maybe we're afraid

They turned off the lights

When we weren't looking

But you know what?

We're still going out

Put on your pumps

Push up your boobs

Primp and pull whatever you have to

Whatever you have to do

Because we're going out tonight

Because something telling me

That party wants us back

And I think we owe it

One more night

His Tattoos

I never liked guys with tattoos
But his tattoos
I don't know

...Something about his tattoos

They look like handprints
Permanently marking him
Saying that this
This is a man you keep
This is a man you hold
This is a man you hold onto

I like touching his arms
Touching where they are
Trying to feel the lettering
Like it could pop up a bit
And I could run my hands
Over the 'B's and the 'E's
And the pleasing way
They make his arms
Feel around me

I love to kiss the gaps
Between the images
And the skin

I love to mark it with my mouth
Knowing it won't melt away
Knowing he'll still be there
Knowing he's permanent

I love tracing my fingers
Over the places he's marked
Seeing the art on his body
On the art that is his body

I never dated a guy with tattoos
But I see his tattoos
And I want him to get more
I want to see the invisible lines
The hands of perfection
Stenciled out on him

I want to see guiding arrows
That direct me to new places
Places on him that I want to touch
And ways to touch those places
And days to do it

I want to see paint by numbers
I want to see portraits
I want to see my name
Tattooed out on him

I want to be something
That stays with him
Stays a part of him

I want to be constantly staying
With him

I want to kiss my name
On his skin

I never dated a guy with tattoos
But then again
I never met a guy
With his tattoos

I think that's what it is

Mrs. Brugel Explains The Cast List

All right, children, now before we being our lesson in multiplication, I want to address the little titters and squitters I’ve been hearing about the cast list for Bambi. I know many of you are disappointed and perhaps even shocked at some of the choices I made in casting the show, and even though in the real world—You know how Mrs. Brugel likes to talk about the real world, since all of you will be entering it in just eleven short years—well, in the real world you won’t get the pleasure of having anything explained to you—ever! But since this is this experience will mark the first of many—or perhaps not so many—in the theater, I feel I can make an exception and explain some of my decisions. As you can see, I’m holding the Bernadette, the hamster, and that means I’m the only one allowed to speak, so please be quiet and Joseph, if I see you spitting in Mary Jane’s hair again I’m sending you to Mr. Garadesian’s office!

Well, to start, I thought all of you did a fantastic audition. But there is such a thing as type. Have you all heard that word before? Type? Well, type means can you play the role without making people go ‘Huh? What? Why is that fat girl playing Skinny the Mouse in Skinny the Mouse Puts on a Pretty Dress?’ Remember last year’s Christmas play when Mrs. Denton cast Juanita Alonzo as Mrs. Santa Clause? I bet all of you were thinking—‘Hey! Mrs. Santa Clause isn’t a stuttering Mexican!’ Mrs. Denton was casting against type—and that is wrong, children. Don’t let anyone tell you it’s not. It’s wrong. Type is there for a reason. You can’t say the sky is green just because artistically you think it should be green. It’s not. It’s blue. Just like Mrs. Santa Clause is white and pretty and doesn’t have trouble saying ‘s’s and Skinny the Mouse has to be skinny. Her name isn’t Chubby the Mouse, because I mean, who would read that book? Not me. And none of you would either, because I wouldn’t assign it.

So right away giving some of you lead roles in Bambi would have been casting against type, and I just couldn’t do that. Tara, you gave an amazing reading as Fawn, Bambi’s lover, but you’re older than everyone in the class because you couldn’t master long division and so this is your second year in the third grade. That means that no matter who I gave Bambi too, you were going to look too old to be their girlfriend—unless of course Bambi has a thing for older women, which I don’t think he does—Hahahaha—Anyway, that’s why I made you Rabbit #3. Now, this might seem unfair, but is it any more unfair than having the rest of the children be ignored while I try to push long division into your little head like a man rolling a stone up a hill? I’d say they’re about equal. You understand equal, don’t you, Tara? Keep plugging away at those worksheets, now. I don’t want to have to relearn the spelling of your Polish last name again next year—all those ‘x’s and ‘t’s strung together like ugly dish towels and cardigans on a clothing line.

Maybe this would be easier if I explained why I did give roles to people. I mean, honestly, if I spend all day telling those of you who didn’t get roles why, most of you would go home and cry into your Pokemon bedsheets for hours and not get your state capitals homework done—and state capitals are important.

Let’s start with the crucial role of Bambi. In casting Bambi, I was looking for someone with a rogue sense of innocence, someone who could project innocence lost and regained in the love of another. That’s why I went with Cooper St. Pierre. First off, I don’t know how many of you have seen The Boy with the Red Balloon, but it is a masterpiece of French cinema, and Cooper looks just like the little boy in it. Since I’ve always seen Bambi as a mammalian version of the Boy with the Red Balloon, it seemed like a no-brainer to me that Cooper had to play the part. Not to mention, he seems to be the only boy in the class who doesn’t scarf down a happy meal immediately after leaving school every day, and so he was the only one I could count on to please our theatergoers when Bambi sheds his clothing and does a dance of spring in the middle of act two. This, by the way, is something I’m adding into the production, as I feel it will move people far more than that ridiculous “Twidderpated” song that Mr. Owl is supposed to sing.

While we’re on the topic of Mr. Owl, I would like to extol—extol, by the way, means to say really nice things about someone you think is godly—the virtues of Jonathon P. Creslin. I don’t know how many of you got a chance to see the Abbigdale Community Player’s production of Seussical last spring, but Jonathon played the little boy in it, and he was fantastic! Two thirds of the way through his solo in “Alone in the Universe” I had a flash of casting genius. ‘He must be my Mr. Owl,’ I said to myself, and to my partner Krista, who was sitting next to me. Now, I know many of you are thinking: If you already knew who you wanted as Mr. Owl, why did you bother even having auditions for the role? To that I ask, why do I let all of you go to Art every Tuesday with Mr. Burke when I know there’s only one or two of you who are capable of doing more than picking snot out of your nose, smearing it on a piece of green colored paper, and calling it avante garde? Because I’m mandated by the school? Yes. But more than that, because of possibility. There’s a possibility that maybe one of you would be better than Jonathon. Granted, it was a minute, almost non-existent possibility that any of you would be better than Jonathon, but still. It's hard to beat someone who has such experience—nothing beats experience, children. There are no more solid debuts in theater anymore. No more break-out stars. If you want a good show, you have to go with what you know. See that? Mrs. Brugel just rhymed. I saw some of you recognize that. Pat yourselves on the back. So anyway, I went with Jonathon. Granted, he does miss almost every other day of school due to his being cast in several high-profile Juicy Juice commercials, and yes, he did quit the Thanksgiving pageant last year leaving me to play the role of Perky Turkey with little notice—not that I didn’t relish the opportunity to step back in the spotlight, to rave reviews I might add—but when working with an artist of Jonathon’s caliber, exceptions must be made. And so what if he ends up transferring to Park View Elementary next year, as many of you have pointed out he might? Jonathon’s Dad has given me his solemn vow that even in that instance, he will gladly drive Jonathon to practice on Tuesdays—the only day of the week Jonathon doesn’t have Method Training—and I trust him, and am very exciting about the opportunity to work with such professionalism.

Now, I know the person most of you are, shall we say, befuddled to see on the list is Camille Ronstadt. I know what many of you are saying. Why not give it to Tara? She’s old. She looks like she’s given birth to a large mammal sometime in the recent past. First off, let me say, her getting the coveted role of Bambi’s mother—who in this production I will be calling Lucinda—has nothing to do with Camille’s mother buying all the lovely ‘Reading is Fun’ posters you see hung up all over the room. Nor does it have anything to do with the kiss some of you may have witnessed between myself and Mrs. Ronstadt last Thursday after auditions. I would like all of you to know that I am very much in love with Krista, and though we are going through a rough patch right now, I would never cheat on her, not even with a beautiful, talented, passionate widow like Mrs. Ronstadt. I would never never do a thing like that—never. Camille got the role because she’s dedicated, easy to get along with, and non-threatening. A quality I thoroughly enjoy. After all, though many directors will deny this, nobody wants to work with someone they feel is better than them. I mean, how can you direct someone if they have more talent than you? It would be like steering an ocean liner with a toothpick. Luckily for me, none of you are even close to being talented enough to intimidate me—okay, maybe Jonathon—but I’ve got my toothpick ready for him! I like Camille because she’s clay—clay I can mold and make into a beautiful ashtray that will get shattered every night at the end of Act One by a greedy hunter who will then—in the form of kabuki theater—bring her onstage, skin her, and eat her hungrily while Bambi watches, praying for it all to end quickly. Camille, I hope you’re ready to take on that kind of challenge. It might require you developing several nervous tics until you finally get it right, but I’m willing to embark upon that journey if you are.

Next we have the role of Thumper. I’ve noticed that many of the girls are in the class had their hearts set on the role. Girls—Thumper is a boy. A boy. Again, type is crucial. I can’t have a girl romping around onstage pretending to be a boy. What would that say about feminine identity? You don’t need to steal roles away from boys to make yourselves feel good enough, girls. I know roles for women are limited in theater, but that just means you have to work twice as hard and not care when you have to step all over somebody to get what you want. As the great Alan Thicke once said to me, ‘Go numb, my fearless lass, go numb.’ The role has been given to Juan Alonzo, Juanita’s younger brother—and clearly the brighter light on the Alonzo family marquee. Although his English is what some of you consider ‘erractic’ a word that means—not always something you can count on—I’m sure with a little coaching, and a lot of repeated viewings of the movie, he just might steal the show.

Flower was an easy role to cast. It’s going to Jesse Stangler. And I’m going to use this opportunity to teach you all a very important lesson about fate. I want all of you to turn and look at Jesse. He’s unclean, he’s smelly, and he’s incredibly effeminate. These are all qualities that I have beseeched—a word that means asked over and over and over again—his parents to do something about this, but to no avail. Jesse’s parents come from the school of live and let live, which is ironically why most of their children will probably die young—and in motorcycle accidents or of undiagnosed hepatitis. So I took Jesse on as a personal mission of mine. Oh sure, scrubbing him clean with a sponge every day during recess might have been a little much, but I bet Tobey Langworthy who sits behind him didn’t mind not having to wear a surgical mask to school every day, didn't you, Tobey? And yes, maybe nicknaming him ‘Tootsie’ to try and break him of his more girly habits was a bit humiliating, but if there’s one thing I know to be true, children, it’s that you can’t get into Tish if you can’t get rid of your swish. That’s right, rhyming again. Points for you, Jonathon. I know you picked up on it. But imagine my surprise when Jesse read for the role of Flower, a gender bending smelly animal that seems to win the hearts of the other animals in the forest—how I don’t know—and suddenly Jesse seemed to come into his own. It was then I knew I could do something called ‘typecast’ him. Typecasting means giving someone the role they were born to play, and there’s nothing wrong with it at all, children. Nothing at all. Up until Jesse read, I was determined to turn Flower into a Woodchuck and cut the role in half. Now, it’s become the role of a lifetime for a prissy little stinker who might die on a Harley one day—and when he does, he’ll remember that one moment on stage clad as a skunk and frolicking off-stage left with glee.

Finally, we come to the most important role in the show: Fawn. It’s true that Fawn—in the original, should I say--male-oppressive script—that Fawn barely had any lines and was merely an after-though to Bambi’s sexual awakening. But I had a vision of her being her own deer. Being a female who could take charge and one day, perhaps, lead the forest as a kind of Eva Peron for the four-legged population. And once I realized how important the role was to the show, I couldn’t give it to just anybody. I simply couldn’t trust any old Mary, May, or Margaret with a role of that essence. And so, after auditioning every single one of the girls in the class, and after two days of callbacks, which I know caused some of you to stop eating for prolonged periods of time—something I see nothing wrong with, as most of you were in dire need of dieting—I decided there was only one option: I had to play the role.

I know many of you are angry with me about this, and I know that you’re saying it’s hypocritical—a word meaning I say eating too much is disgusting and then go home every night and gorge myself on ice cream until the hurt goes away and get away with it because I have fast metabolism given to me by my mother, thank God—that it’s hypocritical to give myself the role, thereby making myself the romantic interest of Cooper and creating a very odd pairing, and then claim Tara would be wrong for it because of her age and general sloppy demeanor, but a director need not always have rationale for her artistic decisions, my children. Sometimes when a talent is so great, exceptions to rules must be made, for the benefit of the production. I know you're all saying Fawn has a song. Can Mrs. Brugel sing? Children, acting isn't about singing, just like singing isn't about singing. Singing is about acting. Remember that. Do you all think I want to go home every night and learn lines while Krista complains that we never have se—um, that we don’t play—um, she just gets mad. Do you think I want to go to a tailor in town and ask them to make a deer costume for a thirty-seven year old woman to wear in a third grade production based on a second-rate Disney movie? Do you think I want to stroke Cooper’s bare chest onstage presenting post-coital bliss in a forest tableau that I will also have to construct myself without any help from any of the other faculty because they claim what I’m doing is disturbing and perhaps, qualifies as child pornography? No! No-no-no-no! I don’t want to do all that, but I have to. I have to because art is important, children. Art is important.

So I hope that settles all the rumors, and that now we can all move on with our lives. Please take our your workbooks, and remember, I expect to see you all here tomorrow at five am for dance practice. There’s no way we’re going to be able to master that twenty-minute ballet at the beginning of the show unless we start right now. You’ll all thank me later when someday you go to a New York callback for Oklahoma where everyone is puking in the bathroom and you’re smiling and singing and dancing your way right into happiness.

We All Make Mistakes

Okay, so let’s get a few ground rules down. I’m not allowed to tell you who I am, what I do, or who I do it for. I can only tell you that I am in the field of espionage. Normally, I wouldn’t even tell you that, but…

I need temporary assistance.

I would like to declassify myself. You see, I’ve made the biggest mistake of my career…

I may or may not have…(Deep breath.)…Hooked up with a nuclear arms dealer.

It was Beirut, and I had successfully completed a mission—namely assassinating the prime minister of Ghana. Did you know Ghana even had a prime minister? Cause I didn’t. And what the hell was he doing in Beirut? I don’t ask these questions. I just do my job.

Well, anyway, the mission went fine, so I was celebrating by taking in some spirits in a local tavern, and…there he was.

I immediately determined that he was a fellow agent, but obviously not working for the same people I was working for. That was fine. I run into agents from all sectors all the time, and usually we buy each other drinks and talk about domestic life until we get a message from home base saying we need to decapitate the guy who just bought us a gin and tonic and leave them in the nearest body of water.

From that point on, things aren’t so friendly.

So, this guy saddles over to me, and we start talking. And…he’s cute. I mean, he’s really cute. And my phone isn’t vibrating, so I’m assuming there’s no need to terminate him—at least not right away.

And he’s buying me drinks, and there isn’t any detectable poison slyly dropped in anything. So perhaps, I let my guard down…just a bit. I notice that he has the new corneal implants, and I remark that I like them. They turn his eyes a nice shade of azure.

He comments on my fiberoptic fingernails. I tell him they don’t work for shit during a thunderstorm and that they should have kept them in Vegas show acts. He laughs. I laugh. I turn my phone off.

Big mistake.

He brings me to a nearby abandoned missile silo. Says he’s loud during sex and that hotels throw him out whenever he hooks up in them. Not unusual. People in my field tend to like sex a little on the rough side. My hag, Amelia, once dislocated a man’s arm during foreplay and then smothered him to death while climaxing. All that just comes with the territory. The guy was marked for death anyway, and let’s face it, it isn’t the worst way to go.

But I digress…

We have mind-blowing—at the time I might even have said nuclear explosive type—sex in the missile silo. At one point, he used a move on me that’s been known to take out Israeli army men…and I enjoyed it immensely.

It was only after we were finished and he disappeared quote ‘To go get bagels and orange juice’ that I turned my phone back on.

TEXT MESSAGE: N.ARMS DEALER IN BEIRUT. TOP PRIORITY.

He was long gone. You have to understand, nobody stays in the same country after they’ve bedded the enemy. You plant your flag and you get the hell out. So there I am, sitting with a flag in me, and wondering what next.

So I’m declassifying. I have served my country well, and I expect my full pension.

As for my discretion, well…

After all, just because I once abducted the Italian Senate and replaced them with recon animatronics, I’m still a human being.

Down with the Ship

Well Travis, you’ve done it again. Booked us on the vacation from the Underworld. No, don’t bother looking for the captain again. I saw him go overboard five minutes ago. He plunged his body into the what-I-can-only-imagine-to-be an icy abyss. Lucky Larry, I think I’ll call him. Lucky Captain Larry. Don’t get your hopes up, Travis. I have not stayed on this ship out of loyalty to you. The lifeboats were all full and even after I knocked out one of the other women with a stray paddle, she still managed to roll her body into a vessel just as it was dropping into the sea. But I’m not bitter about it. I saw a wave split said vessel in half and unconscious woman was promptly swallowed by a sea lion. Have you ever seen a sea lion swallow a human being whole, Travis? I didn’t know it was possible until today. All the things I didn’t know were possible until this very moment. That boats could go three blocks into a port city only to be pushed out again by Portuguese speaking nations. That waves could take the form of animals—cats, giraffes, emus. That love could have conditions. That forced with the choice between saving myself and loving you, loving you didn’t even feel like a choice. I was more torn up about hitting that poor woman over the head than I was about leaving you to drown and only thinking of you every year on the anniversary of the Boyott Terrania sinking into the Atlantic Ocean. I thought of the eulogy I would give. The flowers I would bring to your symbolic yet nonetheless empty grave. I thought of all the tears I’d have to cry. How many? How many does a wife whose stopped loving her husband have to cry when he dies? And even then does she cry for him? Or does she cry for what she had with him at one time? Or simply because she’s supposed to? While you were out running around like a scared child—when you should have been here consoling your wife—I realized that this really is the true revelation of your personality. Ignoring the problem—the boat is sinking. Doing pointless things to combat the problem—looking for a captain as if he was going to be able to plug the hole in the ship with chewing gum or a giant stopper. Forgetting your responsibilities—I could have been raped by one of the lower-class mongrels as some sort of last-ditch hurrah before they gave their lives to the sea. Loving silent action over necessary communication—taking the chance that I might already be gone when you got back. Not being able to say ‘I love you’ one last time—sentimental and dishonest as that statement might be at this point in our marriage. Oh look—the Winspears are trying to swim back to shore. I don’t believe they’re even going in the right direction. Should we yell out to them? Oh, why bother? They’re so gleeful. That must be what it’s like to be in love-filled matrimony. Even when you know you’re going to die, you die so happily because you’ve spent your life with the right person. So you toss around in the ocean while corpses float by you and you try and figure out which way is Jamaica and which way is Sierra Leone. I believe I’ll jump now, Travis. If you somehow make it out of this alive, please donate everything I own to the Goodwill. If I make it out and you don’t, I’ll burn everything you own. Use that as initiative to survive. If we both make it out, I want a divorce. If neither of us does, we’ll have successfully fulfilled our marriage vows. Bravo to us. Perhaps I’ll see you out there, floating on a chunk of something—the ship’s bow or an ottoman from the ship’s lounge. I’d like to say I’ll wave as I go by, but we both know I won’t. Not even out of courtesy. Good-bye Travis. I’m sorry I won’t be able to go down with the ship. I suppose I just didn’t have it in me.

Kiss Your Mother, Boys--She's Been Dancing

Oh, what a glorious thing the Rover’s Bar is at two o’clock in the morning during the week. None of that nasty weekend crowd with the tart girls and the boys looking for something from the tart girls. Tits and sluts! But none of that on a weekday morning before the sun’s come up. No, no, no. When you’re there at two o’clock in the morning—a Tuesday morning specifically—all you get are freaks and gentlemen. Ah, come kiss your mother, boys; she’s been dancing! She’s been dancing with the most glorious men. Tattooed bikers and a man named Freddy, who kissed me with tongue and told me I belonged in a fox museum! (Hoots.) And I kissed him back with no tongue and told him he belonged in a looney bin, and we both had a genuine, good laugh. After having three sons, I thought I could never dance like that again. My feet ache, and my hair’s always tangled, and when I put make-up on I look like a lost mime in a roomful of noise. But tonight it didn’t matter. Tonight every man there wanted to take me home. They begged for me to come back to whatever flat or loft or big old mansion they live in, and I said, I can’t boys, I’m a mother. Then they all groaned disbelievingly, putting on a real show for your old Mum, and told me that was impossible. Since when did girls of fifteen go about having children, Freddy asked all serious like, what’s the world coming to? (Hoots again, even louder than the first time.) Oh, and there was a man there named Miguel—(Pronounces it Mee-gle.)—from Latin—(Pronounces it Lah-teen.)—America. He taught me some things, ho ho ho, he taught me! The tango, the salsa, the—the—this utterly sinful dance where you shake and scream and put your legs up on somebody’s shoulders while they pretend they ain’t staring straight at your knickers! (Massive hooting.) I should have had some decency, boys, but I didn’t. I wasn’t thinking about what the children at school might say about your old Mum. Call me a lush and this and that. Not that I go out every night like Lucy or Kyra, not like them at all. Always been a good girl, I have. Church on Sunday, so no going out on a Saturday. And oh, the repenting I’ll have to do when I see Father Timothy… (Groans, then laughs.) You should have been there, Father, I’ll say, but if you were you’d never be able to let me in the church again! (Spins around like a whirling dervish.) The marriage proposals! The jukebox music! The dogs outside howling at their masters! Oh, Rover’s Bar was dicey, that’s what it was. Dicey and dirty. One day you’ll drink there yourselves, boys. And if I catch you, I’ll string you up, and I won’t care what age you are. No good gentleman belongs in Rover’s, but when you’re teenagers there’ll be no stoppin’ you, and there’s no denying that. Still, a mother doesn’t have to like it. If your Aunt Kelly hadn’t dragged me there, I would never have gone, but then she ended up leaving with some fella, and I stayed. I stayed until the raucous, filthy hour of two o’clock, when all good Catholics are dreaming of the savior in their beds. Now it’s three and I’m even more awake than I was an hour ago! Why didn’t anyone tell me being up at ungodly hours could be such a religious experience? I feel more joy in me now than ever in my life. I feel like Audrey what’s-her-name in that movie where she fell in love with that old coot Rex Harriman. And she danced and sang—although she didn’t do her own singing, you know—but she didn’t have three glorious boys to come home to like I do and recount all her horrid stories that if the town knew about them, they’d take away her little men. But that’s why it’ll be a secret. A secret between a mother and her sons. Now, kiss me, boys. Kiss me and back to bed with you, you have school in the morning, and you’ll have to get yourself up because your mum is going to be sleeping in with the other sinners. (Hoots again, as the lights go down on her.)

Index Cards

I took out books on the statistics. There are whole books, just on the statistics. Survival rates. If you’re actually better off with all those new…organic treatments, I think they’re called. I do the research, because Thomas won’t. He hates when I call him Thomas. He likes to just be called Tommy. I told him I won’t be involved with a Tommy, and he says he doesn’t care. He won’t read the books on the statistics. I make little index cards summarizing the information on them, but he won’t read those either. Still, I have to do something. I have to be proactive. His wife doesn’t do much of anything. She just cries. Not that I blame her. I’ve done my fair share of crying over the past few weeks. I just think at some point you have to stop crying and figure out what you’re going to do, you know? I read. I’m what you might call well-read. It’s one of the benefits of a college education. You learn to take in massive amounts of literature and then develop ideas about them so that you can read an 800-page book on cancer after the married man you’ve been seeing for six years develops it and wants to pretend he hasn’t or that he’ll be fine if he just doesn’t think about it or that he isn’t going to…So, I read…a lot. You know, studies are showing that people don’t read anymore. There are some studies that say they do, but those are all bullshit if you actually look at what the people doing the studies ask the subjects. Nobody tells the truth to somebody in an official position like that. Lawyers, accountants, doctors—we lie to all of them, because we fear what they’re going to tell us. So we think we can come up with a lie and that’ll somehow change the truth. Thomas told his doctor that his cough had only been around for a few days. He’d had that cough for months, and he’d been smoking for years. And what he told the doctor didn’t change the truth. But he didn’t want to hear anything about it from me. My wife nags me enough, he said. So I let him alone, but I still did my reading. He doesn’t read. Won’t read. When we first started seeing each other, I begged him to open his mind more. To expand his line of thought. But he refused. He said take him or leave him, not that somebody else already hadn’t. Thomas can be frustrating like that. A very all or nothing sort of man. At first I thought we never went anywhere because he didn’t want to get caught with me, but then I realized he just didn’t like going anywhere, which was incredibly depressing. I tried dragging him to the opera, jazz clubs, gallery openings, book signings—I come from a very different world than him, so there wasn’t any danger of his friends or his wife’s friends seeing us. But he wasn’t having any of it. He used to say, ‘You like me, because I’m a mutt. So why you trying to make me something else? You don’t want to like me anymore?’ Maybe he had a point. I get asked out every once in awhile by some…type or other. Usually professors. I’m a research assistant and I love my job, but it doesn’t expose me to many different types of people. My family, where I come from, we’re all simple. They’re all simple. Simple, good people. When you tango with academics, you’re asking for trouble. That’s been my experience anyway. So the only person I tangoed with was Thomas. And now… (Pause.) He asked me the other day if I had a favorite poem. He said he needed something someone could read at his… And I got hysterical, which is very unlike me. I said, ‘Don’t talk like that. I’m not picking out any poems for your wife to read at your fucking funeral, Tommy!’ He smiled and I realized I’d called him Tommy. I walked over to the trash compactor and shoved all the index cards in and turned it on. You really can’t change people, you know? They don’t read. They don’t listen. They don’t leave their wives and their children. They don’t seek happiness or passion. They just live and bounce around and eventually they die. That’s how Thomas is. So I put those cards in the compactor as is to say, to hell with it. As if to say, Fine Tommy, we’ll just keep doing things your way for now.

They're All Going in the Same Bed

Before you ask, I’ll answer. I’ll gladly answer you, Charles. Yes, Katie is now in the same bed with the rest of the children. Would you like to know why? Don’t even touch that newspaper until you ask me why I, a person who seems to be in her right mind, would put a perfectly healthy child in the same bed with four sickly, pale, infectious children. Ask me, Charles, ask me. (A beat, then she explodes as if him asking her wasn’t her suggestion.) I’ll tell you why, you son-of-a-bitch! Because I cannot—I cannot!—wait for Katie to get sick like the others. I can’t. It will destroy me if the day comes when Charles Jr., and Meghan, and Persia, and Liam are all healthy and going to school and I have the house to myself again, and I think I’m home free and then little Katie walks up to me and vomits all over my feet. You’ll have to come home from work, Charles. You’ll have to handle it, because I won’t be able to. Because I will be in the looney bin with the loonies, Charles! The loonies! Yesterday Charles Jr. had a fever of 112. Don’t tell me that’s impossible; I know how to read a thermometer! Well, then I suppose I gave birth to a mutant nine years ago, Charles. That must be it. It wouldn’t surprise me since yesterday Meghan coughed up something that I’m fairly certain was radioactive. It ate threw the Kleenex box and men in yellow Hazmat suits had to come and get it. This was while Persia was complaining that there isn’t enough sex on the soap operas that are on during the day. What did you expect? You want to name a child Persia, of course she’s going to grow up to be demented. I’m hoping I won’t have to put her on the pill before she stops believing in Santa Clause. Oh, and Liam, poor Liam yesterday developed bright blue spots all over his body. Blue, Charles, blue. Navy blue, if you want to get specific. And every time he touched one of them he peed the bed, and I had to get all four of them out of the bed, into our bed—which is now probably filled with bacteria and will probably render you sterile—God willing—while I cleaned the filthy, urine-soaked sheets that for some reason smelled like vegetable potstickers—Yes, our son’s urine smells like an appetizer at TGIFridays—and wept, I wept Charles, for the woman I could have been had I not allowed you to talk me into giving birth to your immune-deficient children. Don’t you accuse me of not loving them! No one could never do the things I’ve done over the past week if they didn’t love their children, Charles. Mother Teresa would have balked and run back for the open sores of Bombay if she saw what I’ve seen this week. At one point all I could do was read the Bible over and over again out loud and hope that whatever was causing Persia to pinch her nipples and belch loudly in Liam’s face would be pushed out by the power of the Lord. (A beat.) So now, Katie is in bed with all of them. If she’s going to get sick, she’s going to get sick now and get it over with, and I don’t care if her hair falls out and she starts speaking in tongues; she’s staying in that bed until they’re all healthy and able to go back to school so that I can resume my ironing and my vacuuming and my prescription pill-taking, Charles. And I’ll tell you something else, I’m going back to work. Because for everything I did this week, in ten years, those kids won’t remember it. They won’t remember it, they won’t be grateful for it, and they certainly won’t pay me for it. So I’m going back to work, where having someone sneeze in your mouth can actually has a monetary value. We can get a baby-sitter, if you like, or you can stay home with the children, Charles, but I should probably warn you—flu season begins next month, and Persia’s already started asking where babies come from. Think about it. Oh, and by the way, you’ll be sleeping with the children tonight. They miss their Daddy.T

Tennessee

I like your play. The one about the…haha…the housewife? I liked it. Sort of sad, I like that. But you should keep in mind, my tastes are not the public’s—at times. I mean, they seem to like what I have to say, but that’s because I’m rather soapy, you know. I’m not very minimalist, because well, I don’t know very minimal people. I haven’t had a…minimal…life. Everything was always all sort of grand. Grand joy, grand tragedy, over-the-top ups and downs. I must say, even at its most unpleasant, it’s been a goddammed hell of a ride. I have made what many may call…missteps. I was foolish enough to believe that a life of riches and fame would afford me some leniency in my personal life. The opposite, in fact, was true. I’ve been living under a magnifying glass for some time now. It’s funny. People read my plays about boys with mother complexes, and southern belles, and sexually tormented football athletes, and then when they meet me they’re shocked to find I’m not some ordinary househusband plunking out scripts out on a typewriter right before dinner with the wife and kids. I mean, honestly, could a man…an ordinary man…write Blanche Dubois? Haha…Could Arthur Miller have written Amanda Wingfield? Oh, be reasonable, I always want to say. Be reasonable. Now, you…you write ordinary people. And you also seem…rather ordinary. So you see, you fulfill expectations…at first. But I can read the desperation in you the same way I can read it in your plays. I hope I’m not offending you by saying that, William. I’m sure it’s nothing an average person could detect, but I read your plays and I can feel your heart throbbing in every line. The pulse of a man who isn’t sure he has one. Who thinks he’s going through life like a ghost. People say my character are all hopeless, but I never believed that was true. I believed they were filled with perseverance, because that’s what I’ve known in my life. To be dealt bad hands and then play them expertly. But your plays really are about hopeless people. At the end of my plays there’s madness and abandonment, but somehow—for me anyway—there’s the sense that life goes on. There is a movement towards something. But at the end of your plays, we go back to the status quo, and the idea that…nothing’s really ever going to change. That’s why they make me so sad. They made me want to seek you out, William. Because I read your last play and it was like finding a suicide note. I said, this man’s clock is ticking…down. (Changing tactics.) Do you know, I always have been a whore for talent. I always have seen a creative spark and been drawn to it. Can never say no to a man with a pen and a passion for something. It’s just in my nature. I’d pass by muscle and sinew at every step to get to someone with a thing he needs to say and who…fights to say it. That’s where my interest lies. And now it seems I’ve found someone, and he’s not very long for this world. I do realize, having been around people who’ve…taken their life…into their own hands…that there really isn’t much you can say once somebody’s made up their mind. And I’m not a very expect liar when I’ve had a few drinks in me. So I can’t tell you things will get better, because I’ve seen the other side of that coin, and though it does get easier…it doesn’t really get better. And to be truthful with you, William, if that black cloud ever moved on from hanging over your head, I’m not sure your art could survive it. You are a chronicler of devastation after all, and you do it so damn well. When I wrote Glass Menagerie…oh, it took so much of me. It felt like clawing out my organs and then running a marathon. I didn’t know if I could recover from it. And with its success, I wonder sometimes if I’d write it again, knowing what I know. Or if I’d give myself one less success, and one more stronghold on sanity. I sought you out to tell you that the former is not worth the latter, but I can see you’ve already made your decision. So, Mr. Inge, all I can propose is that we leave here…separately…a few minutes apart. You may meet me back at my hotel, and we two souls can converge in an understanding of melancholy. And perhaps, I can show you the latest thing I’ve been working on. I’d love your honest opinion of it—from one struggling playwright…to another.