I love how real estate terms can be applied to hideous couture

A client came in today carrying a package. It didn’t yield a present for me, so I quickly lost interest. After her session she opened the bag and pulled out a purse that I can only describe as a Muppet that had gone up against a Viking and lost. There was a lot of fur and hardware…so perhaps the Viking didn’t fare so well, what with all of the leather and studs. I don’t know. Regardless, my client held up this pink, THING, and said to me, “This cost over $2k. Do you think I’ll wear it for more than one season?” Well…does that season exist, in, like, Xanadu? Because the only way that shit was going to work was with roller skates, ill-advised eye makeup and a lot of LSD. I didn’t tell her that, though. I wasn’t packing a shiv, and she might have had exceptional knife skills.

What I did say was, “The pink might be somewhat limiting,” and then I turned around to start chewing on my lip furiously so that DO YOU LIVE IN A BORDELLO??? wouldn’t fall out of my mouth and forever hang between us. Instead, I thought Baby Jesus and butterflies. Baby Jesus and butterflies. It's soothing. Try it.

She just twirled the bag in question around for a while and said, “Well, I’ll wear it for a while and see if it goes with enough of my outfits.” At this point, my next client had come in and was sitting on the floor next to me. The Pink Bag & Owner left and my client looked after her for some time. “You know,” she said thoughtfully, “I’d love to see the inside of her closet if she thinks that she has ANYTHING that would go with that bag. Because unless it’s Transvestite Adjacent, I think she’s shit out of luck.”

Healing balm

So there are many things that I enjoy about my life, but what I love the most is being an aunt. My first niece, Holly, was born when I was only just about to turn seven and I’m closer to her and my second niece, Heidi, in age than I am to either of my sisters. For this reason, the whole familial package just sort of blends into one large group of people who are related. However, I’ve changed the diapers of anyone younger than my brother (and there's seven people who fall into that category), an activity that none of my nieces and nephews can claim. Yet. Turnabout is fair play, people, and those Depends have to get on one way or the other.

Anyhoo, we’d all been rather baby deprived up until three-and-a-half years ago when Nicholas came into our lives. He’s my sister Steph’s son. I don’t get to see him anywhere near often enough, and when I do, he’s been more interested in what he can Climb or Take Apart to really pay much attention to That Blond Lady Who Is Always Trying to Kiss Me Stop It PLEASE. I’ve persisted, however, because I HAVE changed his diapers and dammit, you’re going to hug me because I’ve dealt with your poo.

Sunday, I scootched down in the blistering heat to Steph and Tim’s house to enjoy an afternoon with the family. As I’ve mentioned before, the AC is out in my car, so I wilted into the house in a state of extreme dampness considering the temperature was well over 100 and DEAR GOD no one needed to hug me since I was clearly practicing for menopause. Everyone gave me wide berth as I stood in the foyer, a puddle spreading out from around my feet. Nicholas, however, had no such compunction about showing affection and hurled himself around my legs, where he proceeded to slide down to my ankles since he couldn’t get a grip on my skin. But he latched onto me furiously and didn’t let go for the entire afternoon.

If there is anything that will soothe a black mood better than an affectionate child, I don’t know what it is. At some point that weekend, I had cracked through his reality, and he was not going to let me out of his sight. This small person, my little nephew, completely erased the cesspool of negativity that I had been swimming in since Saturday morning. He drew me pictures, he insisted that I sit next to him at all times, he cuddled with me on the couch while we watched The Incredibles. Best of all, though, he came outside with a popsicle for me and insisted that we go and sit up in his tree house together. A date, if you will. And if you have not had such an experience in your life, then I pity you. Even in the withering heat as I sweat through my clothes, there was nothing better about Sunday than that moment, with Nicholas pointing to Kylie explaining, “She’s POOPING Auntie Jen! Then she will go peeps. Popsicle is COLD! Look! Spider! It’s HOT!” I find these kinds of conversations completely enlightening as most of my days are spent speeding through a packed schedule. To take the time to sit - even if my skirt needed to be wrung out - and notice the things that capture the sights of a three year old, well, you’d be astonished as to what you’ll notice.

And on that day, I sorely needed that. Not only the chubby arms around my neck, but for someone to say to me, look! the leaves are green! I pee’d in the potty! let’s spray the dogs with water just for the fun of it! And so we did…and my head felt remarkably healed. It was a good way to start the week.

Evidence

Behold! Before I 'fro'd my hair out, before I put on my white bell bottoms, before I applied my blue eyeshadow, I had to pause as we payed homage to the pose that girls in their early 20's have been doing for ages. It also shows off the sequined top quite nicely, don't you think? You all can forward your thank you notes to Teresa who reminded me that I promised photographic evidence. Don't say I don't follow through.


And, you're welcome.

My almost life as a stripper, Part 2

To say the roar from the crowd was deafening would be like saying the Pacific is damp. A mild understatement at best. We wondered why we were suddenly on stage – it had to be some mistake, the petite woman having led us here accidentally rather than to some back room where we could claim our prizes and then get back to our friends at the bar.

Apparently not.

From somewhere to my right, a large man came out on stage with a microphone in his hand and, with some lame shout – you know, like, one of those “HOW IS EVERYONE DOING THIS EEEEEEEVENING!” type things – brought the deafening noise down to a dull roar.

He went on: “SO! We told you all to come out tonight dressed to party like it was the 60’s and only these six were brave enough to make fools of themselves!” Many drunken cheers rose up and I resisted the impulse to kick him in the shins for the thinly veiled insult. The two drunken girls came up behind the announcer and pawed at him unnecessarily. He didn’t seem to mind.

“We promised them prizes for their costumes, but I think we should make this interesting!” More cheers. “Should we make them DANCE?!” No. NO. NO NO NO NO NO. But all that came from the crowd was a frenzied “YEEEEEESSSSSSS!!! WOOOOOOOO!!!” He came over to my friend, who was at the very left of the stage and said, “Come on our from behind your friend honey…” which she did. Something had changed in her face. I think it was very clear that we were not going to get out of this with any of our dignity intact, so she had just decided to go along with it, which made me realize that since I had buried most of my propriety, one final shove into the grave wasn’t going to hurt anything.

He put his arm around my friend and turned to address the crowd. “SO! What we’re going to do is put on some music…and whomever of our 6 friends here dances the best gets THIS!” The petite woman returned and had in her arms a leather jacket with HOUSE OF BLUES stitched into the back…something like the 8 Ball coat that Puddy wore on that episode of Seinfeld. Seriously. Not that what I was wearing would win any prizes, mind you, but really? They were making us dance for THAT?

Suddenly, Wild Thing came on full blast and the announcer pushed my friend out into the middle of the stage, where she did her best to shake what she’d been given. Somehow, we had been separated, and our two guy friends went next. What they lacked in rhythm, they made up for in dexterity, the both of them flailing their limbs about with much gusto, the one closest to my friend picking her up and swinging her around in such a manner that her underwear color was no longer a mystery to those within eye-shot. Bright pink, if you care to know.

Then it was my turn. For some reason, the announcer had been eyeing me for the past two minutes. He held up his hand and the music stopped. He came over to me, perhaps blinded by my top, I don’t know and said, “Sugar, what’s your name?” And I told him. And he said, “Are you going groove for us?” Sure, I replied, why not? I REAAAAAALLLLLLY want that jacket. He laughed, hearing my sarcasm and said, “I think you’ll do me proud. Shake it.” And with that, the music started.

And I did. Shake it, that is. Underneath it all, I must be an exhibitionist, because I can’t lie and say that wasn’t fun, being up there having a thousand people scream at you while you do your thing. Whee! The announcer even got into it, twirling me around a few times.

The two drunk girls were last. They were neither dressed up or really, I think, even aware of what was going on. I stopped after having executed a slide across the stage on my knees and waved my hands at them to say, “YOUR TURN.” And guess what fun maneuver they decided to go with?

They started making out. YES THEY DID. I saw about 600 male jaws go slack simultaneously.

Guess who won the jacket by a landslide? Whores.

I did win something, which after ten years as been obscured by my fuzzy memory. But as we made our way down from the stage we were assaulted by free drinks and many declarations as to how brave we were. Not really. We were merely Shanghaied with the promise of non-existent swag.

We battled back to the bar to our waiting and highly amused friends. I was enjoying my drink when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned around to face a young guy, probably in his early thirties, who was dressed in requisite LA black. I don’t recall much about him other than he was hot and I was suddenly very aware of my ridiculous outfit in a way I hadn’t been all evening. He had a smirk on his face and said, “Where do you dance?”
“Excuse me?” I replied.
“Dance. What club do you dance at?”
“Besides this one? I don’t know where else we're going tonight.”
He sighed, exasperated. “No. I mean where do you dance for work?”
A little light went off in the back of my mind. Surely, he didn’t mean what I thought he might mean. “Oh, you mean, like, DANCE-dance?”
“Yes,” he said, smugly.
“Um, I don’t do that.”
“Well, you should. I just opened up a club in Hollywood, and if you can do there what you did here tonight, we have a place for you.” And with that, he slipped a card into my hand and finished off by saying, “Call me if you’d like to consider it.” I stood there with my mouth agape and my Afro drifting down over my eyes.

“OH MY GOD JEN THAT GUY JUST OFFERED YOU A JOB AS A STRIPPER!” This from one of my guy friends who immediately grabbed the card and examined it. “I KNOW THIS PLACE! It just opened and is supposed to be amazing. Come on Jen, be open-minded. I'll bet they have great chicken wings!”

We left once the band came back on, deciding that we had made fools enough of ourselves for one evening. Because really, I’m not sure you can come back from the sheer awesomeness of getting down to Wild Thing in a bar and then being offered payment for taking your clothes off. Can you recover from that?

We got into the cab to head home and a silence fell over our group. The lights of LA streamed by, reflecting off of the wet pavement, lulling us. We exited the freeway and started weaving through the residential streets towards my friends home when one of the guys suddenly popped up, a thought having roused him from near sleep. "JEN!" he said, "You should have totally asked if that job came with dental!"

Before I could crawl over the backseat and choke him with some sequins, my friend piped up, "No, she wouldn't dance for dental, but a good eye plan? That might sway her." Which made me pause for a moment, because DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD A GOOD EYE PLAN IS TO FIND? Very.

You'll be happy to note, however, that I didn't choose that route. My virtue has remained intact. I do, however, still have the tube top which has been brought out for several Halloweens. However, I can't hear Wild Thing without thinking of that night and considering how my career options suddenly flourished regardless of my mothers insistence that I never take dance lessons. That poor woman. What she doesn't know will let her sleep at night.

My almost life as a stripper, Part 1

Have I ever told you about the time that I got asked if I wanted to become a stripper? No? I hadn’t thought of this story in a long time, but half way through a hip-hop class that cost me most of my dignity and several hard-earned dollars, the memory came flying back to me with chagrin inducing clarity.

When I was little, I spent much of my time up a tree. This is pertinent only because while all of my friends were heading off to ballet or tap or jazz, I was playing war outside with my brother. So while part of me wanted to put on pink tights and twirl around, I was more intent on perfecting my use of as sling shot which, may I say, was/is pretty precise.

I think this delighted my mother who would have given an emphatic NO to my request for dance class. She deduced, from where I’m not sure, that any hyper-awareness of the body would lead to sex, or at the very least, masturbation. I defied this logic through much of college by dancing on speakers and definitely NOT getting laid. Did you know that you can be Puritanical in your morals and still get down at least twice a week to the blaring rap that comes out of most frat houses? Bible truth, you can.

Somewhere in those four years, I got enough compliments on my "unique" dancing style to think that I was something of a good dancer. I thought people were just giving me wide berth because of the danger my elbows and flailing hands posed, but perhaps it's just because I was AWESOME on the dance floor. Let's just go with that.

Post-college and off the speakers of the Sigma Chi house, I went out with girlfriends in San Francisco to decorate whatever dance floors were available. Even better were weekends in LA. I had several friends who lived down there and the options were staggering compared to the dearth of good clubs in SF.

I was headed south one weekend when my friend called and mentioned that we were going to a 60’s themed party at House of Blues. Costumes were required to get in. This was a problem, since my closet screamed BANANA! REPUBLIC! at you in all caps when you opened it, but my friend assured me that we would take care of that upon my arrival. The next day, we headed out to a shop on Melrose where I found the most amazing sequined tube top that I had ever laid eyes on. I’m easily distracted by shiny things and this particular piece was like a prism. A HORRIFYINGLY TACKY prism, which was even better. I bought it without thinking and was ready to dress up like a disco queen for the night.

Which I did! I teased my hair into some approximation of a blond Afro, donned the gold, glittery top, white bell bottoms, and platform shoes and we headed out with our friends, guys who had shown up with fluffed chest hair and a cascade of gold chains. It was fabulous. There are pictures, somewhere, I’m afraid to say.

Anyhoo, we took a cab to House of Blues and got in line. It was a winter night so, but for my insane hair, I was under a heavy overcoat. I wasn’t really paying attention to anyone else, but did notice a guy down the way in a huge, blue Afro. He gave me a thumbs up, which I returned and then turned back to my friends, huddling together against the offending mist and wind.

We were finally inside, took our coats off and headed into the club. What we didn’t realize is that, apparently, costumes were optional this particular year. While we stood out in our 60’s appropriate attire, everyone else - EVERYONE ELSE – was wearing cute, black, L.A. evening wear, and we, amongst a throng of roughly one thousand people, were dressed like lunatics. I turned to my friend, horrified, and said, “BAR. NOW.” She was dressed in a skirt so short a gynecological exam would not have been impossible and a fringed tank that left little to the imagination. She just looked at me and said, “Indeed.”

My top, which had been merely glittery in the afternoon sunlight was electric inside. I don’t know what black magic that lighting system was playing with the sequins, but I was like a disco ball walking through the place with light bouncing off of me as I made my way to where the drinks were being served. It was not subtle. The huge halo of blond hair bouncing around on my head didn’t help.

But shots did!

I stopped at two, not because numbing the reality of the evening wasn’t an alluring idea, but throwing up all over my platform shoes in the presence of so many people dressed in this manner…well, I needed to maintain some scrap of decorum given my dress. I decided after that last shot to just fuck it and go with the flow. I’d probably never see these people again and certainly, since I’m not in the habit of wearing belly baring shirts and coating my eyes in blue eyeshadow, I would never be recognized even if I did.

Hours passed. We danced. The band stopped for break, and so did we. We had become friends with the blue Afro guy from the line as he and his friend were the only other people besides our group of six who were dressed up. We converged on the bar as music blared from the speakers waiting for the band to come back. Mid way through my drink, a felt a tap on my shoulder and turned to see a petite woman behind me. She was the event planner and had noticed my top from the DJ booth. “GREAT OUTFIT!” she screamed over the music. “WILL YOU AND YOUR FRIENDS FOLLOW ME? WE WANT TO GIVE YOU SOME PRIZES FOR ACTUALLY DRESSING UP!” Blue Afro guy and his friend went, “Hells-YEAH!” and my friend and I shrugged and decided that we ought to gain something from looking so foolish. The rest of our group opted to stay behind, even though there was the promise of swag involved.

We followed the woman up some stairs and down a back hallway and into a large room with a curtain on one end. We could hear the muffled roar of the crowd out in the venue, but didn’t really think much about it. There was free shit to be had, after all. The small woman rounded us up into a group and merely said, “Wait here,” and then was gone. My friend and I talked to the blue Afro guy for a while. Two other VERY DRUNK girls, though not costumed, had followed us back somehow, and they were giggling in the corner while we all discussed exactly how happy we were to have made asses out of ourselves because we were going to GET TREATS!

And then that curtain that I had mentioned? That was at one side of that large room? Yeah. It went UP. We were ON THE MOTHER FUCKING STAGE AT HOUSE OF BLUES. With about one thousand people screaming at us.

And I was in a gold, sequin tube top. With a blond afro that, at this point, had wilted to one side.

I died a thousand deaths. My friend cowered behind me, worried that with the elevation of the stage, the people down below were getting an eye full of her cervix. My thoughts, as I watched all of these people howl up at us were, “Please, sweet fancy Moses, do not let my mother find out about this,” followed by, “This swag had better be REALLY excellent,” followed by, “I hope these jeans make my ass look good.”

I’ll tell you the rest tomorrow. Because I have to dredge up the top and photograph it for you so that you get the full effect. I suggest wearing sunglasses.

Back.

Hello? Anyone still there? Yoohoooo....

So, the longer I went without updating, the easier it was to forget about my little blog. Instead of calling that laziness, let's go with "inertia"...it just sounds better and as though perhaps I had other important things to do and wasn't just sitting on my ass watching So You Think You Can Dance.

Actually, I was attending to the business of Trying to Feel Better which, in my case, has been a full time job. Last month, I was finally diagnosed with an auto-immune disorder. I say finally because I've spent the better part of the past 6-10 years wondering what exactly the hell was wrong with me and it would appear that my symptoms - which covered everything from raging insomnia to extreme social anxiety - can be blamed on my bodies dislike for, well, itself. Essentially, my insides have been in constant battle and it took several doctors and any number of probing instruments and tests to figure this out. Let's just say that I've been poked so many times in so many different areas of my body that if I so much as hear the snap of a latex glove, I'm going to climb up your body and wrap myself around your head in fear that an index finger covered with lube is heading my direction.

Good times.

So over the past month, I've been taking an exorbitant amount of medication and have been on strict instructions to avoid stress, sleep and eat well. This would be somewhat easier if I didn't have this tiny little thing called REAL LIFE to contend with. I asked the doctor if he could write a prescription for a cabana in Hawaii or at the very least a trust fund. A humorless man, he merely looked at me and said, "No, just take these," and handed me my medications. I left before he could head towards the gloves and ask me to drop trow.

So I'm back, somewhat tentatively. I've missed writing but have found that over the course of these weeks, my brain has shifted. I'm not exactly dulled, but I've found that I'm less prone to imaginative thought. This is somewhat frightening, since I base my livelihood on my tendency to sympathize with the crazies, but I've been assured that this too will pass and I'll be back to my normal self...meaning the voices in my head will return and the space between my ears will stop being so echo'y.

But thanks to those of you who have sent such kind emails. The fact that you find this site entertaining and have made it a part of your life is hugely encouraging to me. Writing can be such a lonely task and I think I share many writers worries that our work is irrelevant. So for your notes, I'm so grateful. And extremely humbled.