Bedtime Stories: a Stream of Consciousness.

I can’t stop thinking about the Wolf in Little Red Riding Hood.

(Consequently, I have had Lit’l Red’s song from Into The Woodsalternating and repeating after  Ani Difranco’s I am Not a Pretty Girl. Oh, wait Green Day’s Boulevard of Broken Dreamshas snuck in there too…..)  

It’s common knowledge the story is about molestation. 

The wolf eats the grandma too…..why? 

I get lusting after the young virgin breaching the shores of her sexuality, but the dried up granny.. huh…. where’s the “yum” in that? 

Maybe the wolf is just into extremes. But could he possibly salivate with desire after Grams the way he salivates after Little Red? Or does he only eat grams because he needs her clothes? Maybe, the wolf has a feddish for granny panties?

If this is indeed a story about molestation then it’s only reasonable to assume that the author is indicating that both the little red and her grams are violated by the animal. 

I’m joining the WAMOG  ( women against the molestation of grandmas) tomorrow.;)   That may sound smug, but I would though …if was a real organization on myspace.  

Perhaps the animal just gets off on destroying the personal power of one too young to know she had any; and of one who’s physical strength is too wizened to protect her personal power.  

How would it feel to have lived through your period, child birth, and menopause…

Not to mention the million things that can go wrong with a va-jay-jay or her old pal uterus….

Maybe you’ve lived through a  sever std, endometriosis- any va-jay-jay disease- or anyone of the womb cancers…a hysterectomy….

 Think of it…all the hormones, emotional and physical pain as the chemistry that defines what you are evaporates over time.

Knowing that as you age you become less  of a woman…… 

I can’t imagine what it would be like to be an old woman, who lived her life cycle, and now, at the finish line, is violated.

Perhaps the young girl and her grandmother are supposed to represent the beginning and end of womanhood.  Perhaps the story is not about child molestation but about rape.  It’s a warning that no woman is safe from the wolf- the animal.

I don’t buy into that shite that rape is only about power.  Rape is about getting off and the only way certain kinds of people can get off is by taking away another person’s personal power.   Case closed.

The wolf and the woodcutter are both men.   I think the woodcutter is man just so that not all men are represented by the wolf.   Which is good.  I have only known one true wolf in my life. 

All the others have been more woodcutter than wolf.

Very few survivors are “saved” by men.   Unless of course one of the survivors is a man.

 Survivors save each other.

That much I know for sure.

“Dating”

. 

I went on a trial date. 

 Vocab: The elements that make up a first date are, for the most part, the same elements that make up a trial date. However, a trial date is different from a first date because the two people in question have previously hooked up while crunk-drunk.  So, a trial date is the coming together of two sober individuals who have recently hooked up while inebriated in order to legitimize their debaucheries on street corners.  A synonym for trial date is “date”. Which is not to be confused with date.

An example of a debauchery on a street corner would be- and this is just a for instance- a foxy vampirate captain making out with a pimp on a street corner in Manhattan on Halloween.   Perhaps they even hooked up prior to that moment . Maybe  on the gettin’-lucky corner of 28th and 7th? On any old Wednesday, October 19, 2007. 

It’s just an example; and an example could be anything, anytime, anywhere. 

Anyway, maybe these two people think it would be fun to go on a “date” but not a date.   So they do and it is fun.  The exciting thing about a trial date is that it always ends in humiliation brought on by the self. 

An example of that might be getting rejected by someone you didn’t think you could feel rejected by while you’re half naked….again.  Then going  home to find that  unbeknown to you, the new laundry detergant your clothes were washed in plus all the rubbing up against someone else made you break out into hives around your boobs.  So, you pose this question to yourself: Oh my god, did he think I have tit-zit?

 That’s just Hott-awesome if you ask me.  Again,  just an example.

(I’ve heard it only takes 48 hours for the itching and red bumps to go away, so, it’s not like you’re physically scared for life. Emotionally on the other hand, you’ll always wonder if he thought  you were gross.)

It’s hard to be judged by someone you truly care about.  It real freakin’ terrorizing to be judged and dismissed by someone you don’t know.  The details of how one is dismissed is not important. What’s important is what you do with your notice once you get it.   This time I will use myself as an example.

  I go for a quick status change for an intimidating effect.  First, I’m vulnerable and affected by what the other person is saying until the words, ” What is this?” passes through my mind.  That’s when I put on my clothes- very quickly- and essentially say to the other person, ” It’s alright. I just realized I didn’t want to date you anyway.”  I thank them for a free movie, collect my things, say goodbye to the cat, dog, house pet, or roommate and then I go home. 

The wonderful thing is is that I– I mean the universal I– truly don’t want to date someone who doesn’t want me—as in the universal me meaning us—.  So, I’m/ you’re always happy- on some subconscious level to be rejected quickly; so that I-you can be free of him.

It’s very easy to leave a place with dignity, grace (not Helbig), humility and personal power.  But I’ve found , however, that it’s much harder to keep it all together as you travel home alone. 

I- as in me and only me- cried. It wasn’t about the boy- he could have been any boy.  It’s about the fact I found myself in familiar territory when I’m just looking for something different.  I let all those secret insecurities seep up from deep down inside my solar plexix through my spine, into my lungs, over my heart up into my throat and out my tear ducts. 

I had my first ciggarett since I quit 100 days ago.  I’ve had two others since. 

Next time I’m going on a DATE not a date or a “date” but real DATE.  With someone who is at least approaching DATING from the same perspective.  

I have learned that “dating” is not for me.

Tell Me Quick! Ain’t that a kick in the head?

                   My head keeps spinning. I go to sleep and keep grinning
                    If this is just the beginning, my life’s gonna be beautiful.

 If Dorothy Parker and Dean Martin were to get in fight? Well, I’d put my money on Dorthy kicking Dean’s ass any day.  

  Thus far in my life, any romantic encounter I have dared to venture out on has started in the spirit of Dean Martin and ended in the spirit of Dorthy Parker.  You’d think that means all the men I date are gay.  But no,  it’s not that simple. It seems I have a different problem.  Well, two really.  The first one is timing and the second, well, the second……

I am the personified version of…a screen.  Apparently.   I know, it’s not very exciting.  If one is going to discover that one is the personified version of an inanimate object one hopes it would be something dangerously sexy, breath taking and inspirational.  For example, a bungee cord, or a parachute or  a F17 stealth fighter jet. 

   No ma’am, No sir, I am a screen.  I am nearly translucent except for the frosted effect around my edges that’s only there to frame the projection of memories.  I’m shaped like a woman and that alone is enough send men spiraling down the dark cavernous tunnels of their minds into long forgotten painful memories of the mundane humdrum, of heartbreak,of  boredom, of restricted freedoms and of crazy-lovers-past.

The wonderful thing about me is that I come with very real 3D effect.   Most screens are flat, but seeing as I am shaped as a woman, I come with ample curves in all the right places. If you touch me, I feel like a woman.  I feel exactly like a woman. I’m  warm,smooth and soft.    If you dare kiss me you’ll find it’s an experience.  Just like any other woman a man has been with my mouth is hot, wet, fleshy and giving. My back arches,my body has rhythms it follows, my hand will reach,explore, caress, grab, glide, pull, squeeze, and release.  I mean as if I were a real- honest-to-goodness-person-woman.  It’s crazy. It’s crazy.  It’s CRAZY BUT TRUE.   Mind blowing…or just blowing.  I can do that too.  In fact, I’m capable of doing it.  You know, doin’ it- doin’ it.  It’s maddening! How is it possible? How has such a screen come to exist right under your eyes with out you knowing?   Only God, Nature, and the Universe can answer that question.

 It only helps that I’m also a classically trained actress.  For a screen that is brilliant training and not a bit ironic even in your cliche Alanis Morrisette sort of way. 

 Let me tell you what you can do with my audio  Turn it up, Turn it down, mute, pick a language, hell, pick an accent, octive , tone or customize a giggle….a moan…a fuck-off…if you’re into it.  Whatever. 

You can even let your subconscious or conscious insecurities run wild! Remember, you’re safe.  I’m just a screen that happens to be person-like in my person but without personage.  Trust me, even I’m flabbergasted by what I can do. 

I come with CHANNELS! For a time I was confused and constantly asking myself, “What is happening?” “What in God’s version of hell on earth is occurring before my eyes?”   I would think to myself, “I was just me and now I’m someone else and no one simultaneously.”  A screen is a perfect object.  It is no one but it can be someone.  I have discovered that men fully recognize my potential.  To them I am me flesh,bone, muscle, brain, heart, boobies, va-jay-jay.  I am the screen.  As me I am entertaining, engaging, funny, charming, adorable and suspect.  I trigger the impulse to free associate in the brain.  Suddenly names that aren’t mine appear in the man’s mind and with the name memories.  There is a shift behind every man’s eyes when he’s changed the channel on the screen and suddenly I know I am no longer me, but the projected image of someone else.  Someone who brings with her a cluster-fuck of emotional crazy.  Someone who is about to be rejected for the things that she has done in the past before she can do them again.  And as suddenly as the channels changed the first time, I am back to being me, but, in the presence of catharsis. A great emotional change has occurred and I am about to feel the ramifications of relived memories. 

I am the screen.  I am that which in a moment the past might be projected on.  I am eclipsed by the shadows of others and I can no longer be seen for who I might be.  Possibility is forgotten in the certainty of experience and I’m turned off. 

I’m pretty sure Dorothy Parker would have something to say about that.

2 Good 2 Be 4gotten

Life passes very quickly until suddenly, for no apparent reason, there is a pause.  And in that pause one’s inner voice pipes up, ” Shit, I forgot to blog.”

I forgot to blog for a whole year.  I forgot the name of my blog. I forgot the name of the website I’m supposed to be blogging on.  I forgot because I wasn’t blogging for anyone but myself.   I forgot because I didn’t have time to remember.

I’ve been raising Max and Max’s little sister Olivia (Who is now 15 months old), I’ve become an improv artist,  I am finishing “Improv school”, I’ve started my own improv team, I’m on house sketch team at The People’s Improv Theater, I’m taking an Acting class at Micheal Howard Studios,  I quit smoking,  I spend two hours in Central Park every morning exercising and writing in my journal, I’ve made 21 new good friends and 45 new sorta-friends, I’ve had many long talks with The Good Doctor, I dated 15 men ( not one of them worked out for a myriad of reasons….), I’m at an ADHD clinic at hospital in Manhattan, I’ve been writing writing writing and acting acting acting while nannying nannying nannying and I’m still poor but happy. 

In the last year I learned:

* My sense of humor will secure my future.

* My folly is my inspiration

* I’m shy, but I can get over it.

* Finding the right person to love is a quest not a journey and dating men you met over the internet is just asking for crazy.

* Money grows from trees not on them.

* My sense of compassion is my sixth sense.

*Improv is a way of life.

* That I am blessed, gifted, and fucking lucky.

* I am loved by those who love me and I can forgive those that don’t

* That waking up is not a bad thing.

* Trust is a currency.

* Family is a burden that everyone must bare.  Learn to just enjoy it.

* Not everyone’s opinion matters.

* Listen then take action.

* Don’t forget to breath. 

Quick Quip

Max: Charlie, do you love me?

Charlie: Why do you think I’ve been hanging out with you for six years?

Max: Not really six years…you went away last year.

Charlie: But I came back to you. Didn’t I? That means I love you to pieces.

Max: All my pieces?

Charlie: Yep.

Max: Even my penis?

Charlie: Max, I thought this was gonna be one of our cute and innocent conversations….

Max: Nope.

Charlie’s Believe It Or Not

Today I told Max and the Cab Driver the truth about Max’s ancestry. 

Charlie: Well, Max, it turns out your mommies bought you off an old Silver-Back while they were at the Bronx Zoo one afternoon. He kept getting harassed about having a hairless albino monkey that could scream like a human baby. So, he pasted a “For Sale” sign on your back and placed you at the front window.

Max: If I were a monkey, I would have bugs in my hair.

Charlie: You did, your mom and I had to flee-dip you after the school sent you home with bug in your head. I kept thinking, “This isn’t human” So, one day I asked your mom, “is this a little man or a little monkey.”  That’s when she told me the truth.

Cab Driver: Monkeys can’t talk.

Charlie: Freakish monkeys can. Your moms thought about taking you on the road with a carnival, so you could pay for your college education.  I guess at the last minute they changed their minds.

Cab Driver (getting into the story) Why did his mom change her mind?

Charlie: She’s a psychologist and she thought that  caging him could be psychologically damaging.

Max: ( a revelation)  I’m a  monkey.

Charlie: Looks like it.

Max (pauses to ponder then screams) NO! NO I’M NOT A MONKEY! I’m a little man!

Charlie: Whatever you say- little man…..

*************************************************************************************************************************

(Later that same day. Max and Charlie are walking down the street together. Max is skipping and swinging his jacket around)

Charlie: Max, can you please stop whipping me with your jacket. The zipper hurts.

Max: Charlie, life is worse than death.

Charlie (flabbergasted) What?! Why do you say that?

Max: In life there is hurting in death hurting stops.

Charlie: That’s a very keen observation Max, but how do you know in death hurting stops?

Max: Because you’re dead.

Charlie: Right.

(Max and Charlie come to a crowded street corner. It’s very noisy because there are many trucks passing by. Everyone is waiting for the walk light.)

Max:(yelling) Charlie, do you know what is worse than death?

Charlie: Apparently life.

Max: Do you know what’s worse than that?

Charlie: What?

Max: Losing your soul.

Charlie: I would agree with that statement.

Max: What? I can’t hear you.

(Two big delivery trucks are driving by)

Charlie: (yelling) Losing your soul is worse than death!

Max: Huh?

Charlie (yelling even louder) You are right! Losing your soul is worse than life or death!

Max: What are you saying?

Charlie (Yelling even louder) I AGREE WITH YOU ( the trucks drive away but charlie is too busy yelling to notice the noise has dissapated) LOSING YOUR SOUL IS WORSE THAN LIFE OR DEATH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(The crowd of people turn to look at Charlie.)

Old-Woman-With-Puss-Face: You shouldn’t talk to children about that.

Charlie: Believe it or not, he brought it up.

Max: (Looking directly at the old woman) NO. I didn’t.

(Walk light turns and everyone begins to cross the street. Charlie stands on the corner holding Max’s hand)

Charlie: You sold me out.

Max: That will teach you for calling me a monkey.

Charlie: (shocked) Did you plan that?

Max: Like mom says….I saw an opportunity and I took it.

Charlie: When did you become and evil genius.

Max (with true sincerity) In the cab. 

And they called her…..

Olivia…;)

It’s a Girl!

And a big girl…weighing in at 8 lbs 12oz! She has yet to be given a name; so I christened her Ms. Ladybug. Ms. Ladybug was born at 12:50pm on September 6, 2006!  I love her…she is an adorable little she-being and doesn’t have a squishy alien face at all!

Read or Not, Here Baby Comes and We Can’t Hide!

MAN- IT’S A GOOD THING I DIDN’T GO TO SLEEP!

No more than five minutes after I finished that post the Good Doctor called to tell me L’s water broke and it was time for me to bring the bag of “Needed Things”! I was able to get from L’s place to the Good Doctor’s in about 8 minutes. (Lucy prevails!) 5 minutes after that they were off to the hospital!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I’m a nervous wreck, yet I’m filled with excitement! I can’t imagine what L is feeling…well…she already said “Pain” but I mean emotionally….. LOL! We’ve waited for years for this baby and this little being is finally about to make it’s way into the world… we don’t even know if it’s a he-being or a she-being.

Either way, we are sure to love it…for no other reason than we were meant to…..

We shall see what the Raven Man brings us in the morning….

We Were Only Joking about the Mexican!!!!!

 Over dinner tonight, at a swank Mexican restaurant on the Upper East Side, I was joking with The Good Doctor, Max and L (who is nine months + over due pregnant) that the intense spiciness of the food might induce labor. 

 Ya know…Ha Ha…what a funny JOKE!?!

Not on my life did I mean it!   Yet it is 1:36 am and I am UP UP UP because L  just called for me to pack her hospital bag. Ya know- the bag that has the birth nightie, focus object, how to breath pamphlet and other labor shite woman need when you know….when they go into labor and stuff….the things they NEED! Now I am in charge of the “things NEEDED” bag???!!!….oh man, I totally should have stayed at The Good Doctor’s tonight—NO! no—cuz then I would have just had to come over here –to L’s apartment–to get the bag. Looks like this time, I might just be in the right spot at the right time….oh man….wow…this weird…a baby…. 

It seems the spicy food put a fire in that baby’s butt and now it’s suddenly ready to head out….literally…

L’s in pain, man….pain…

So, the Good Doctor puts her on the phone to tell me what she will need…..

and what does my face open up and say?

“Good for you, L!”

What does she say?

“Good for me? Yeah-well this hurts…..”

(I know what you’re thinking, “Way to go Charlie…wicked smart…” well not everybody uses the term wicked-that’s a New England thing- but ….if you’re not thinking that then you’re probably thinking “What to go, Charlie… dumb-ass….!)

L went to or for her “unstressed” test today (that- for people who don’t know- is a test to see how stressed the baby is in the uterus. It’s normal for late babies to go for this test), and the nurse said the baby was chillin’ and probably wasn’t looking to make an appearance until sometime next week.  Hell, I thought it turned down some wrong canal and got lost in there………NOPE! Turns out the baby was just lookin’ for a little inspiration, and found it inside the zing of chilies!!!!!!!!!!!! 

 And then the Good Doctor says, “Labor can take hours….get some sleep.  Keep your phone by your head in case we need you to bring the bag sooner than we expect.”

Sleep? SLEEP?  Wait, you want me –the reincarnation of Lucille Ball- the woman in charge of the “NEEDED THINGS BAG”  to delve into the realms of unconsciousness……OH I DON’T THINK SO!!!!! NOT ME….sleep? I don’t know the meaning of the word for the next 24 hours!

Why God? Why did I think I was in the all clear to take some Sudafed? Cuz Man- Dude- my eyes are heavy and the world is cloudy, but my anxiety is wide awake! 

Which one will win out? Anxiety or Sudafed?

If Anxiety wins, the worst thing that happens is I deliver the bag to L on time but I am in a drug induced state for most of the day until nap time…if i get a nap time…..if I don’t get a nap time I might lose a few brain cells–but that’s okay… if L gains a little peace of mind whilst having a being—such as a human one–not to be confused with something alien (although it might look it…some babies have really squishy faces……)

If Sudafed wins will I wake up when the phone rings? Will I get the “Needed Things Bag” to L on time? Will L have peace of mind whilst giving birth to her non-alien human -being?

Tune in tomorrow…same time…same channel…..

(man if this turn out to be a false alarm this is going to be a debunked cliffhanger!

That baby better come….cuz I ain’t losing brain cells twice….;)