Some friends visiting Chi-town met me for lunch today and we got to talking about how the Tsunami has been represented by U.S. media. My friends reported that the picture chosen by our hometown paper to represent the natural disaster was of a collapsed Starbucks. (Don’t worry Asian island dwellers–there is another Starbucks just ten yards from this one that is perfectly intact. Damn globalization!) It kills me that a corporate name receiving damage would take precedence over the people of those nations. Although I wonder if my hometown’s news editor’s assumption that small town Americans would be unable to empathize with foreign people an ocean away is a true one. I wonder if the familiarity of a Starbucks in shambles draws more compassion from my fellow midwestern dwellers than a brown-skinned face in agony. I sincerely hope this isn’t so, but remembering the hideous reactions to the few non-white citizens that found their way my slumbering hometown makes me doubtful.

I am curious–how has the media been treating the situation in the communities of my fellow Xanga authors?

While writing at work is not a habit I want to start in on, my boss is out on vacation, and I’ve run out of ways to appear productive for the day. That’s not to say I’m trying particularly hard. I had a painful, cancer-ridden mole lanced off of my body yesterday, and it was in quite an unsavory location. Now, I am sore, crabby, and feeling ambushed by the effects of sleep-deprivation, emotional exhaustion, and drinking acquired over the holidays. I curse the hourly-pay rate system, as it is the only thing that is keeping me in my cubicle today.

 

Anyhow, that little hissy fit wasn’t what I had planned for your reading enjoyment. Rather, it is the phone conversation that my co-worker is having with her office door open. She is trying desperately to get her friend to cancel her honeymoon vacation to Thailand, coming up this week. After the horrific devastation that has ravaged that area, I find it appalling that anyone could be so out of touch with reality that they couldn’t imagine what landing in the midst of such horror would be like. What kind of a spoiled brat do you have to be to think that you will still be catered to on a Thai beach vacation when the resort you have reserved a room at is now reduced to a pile of sticks and dead bodies litter the sandy white beaches you planned to be sunbathing on? My coworker tried to convince her, “There will be disease! During my China trip I saw farm animals floating in the Yangtze. Those freaked me out, and they were only animals! Call the airlines! Change your plans!” 

 

Anyhow, overhearing the piggish attitudes of my co-workers friend provoked me to donate to the Unicef relief fund that is being set up for the affected Indian Ocean areas. I felt badly listening to the NPR reports this morning, but nothing motivates me to take action like the attitudes of ignorant Americans. I hope you will all log on to www.unicef.org and help if you can.

When I was a girl, my grammar school playground replaced it’s rusty teetering slides and squeaky, lanky swings with a bright and careful, plastic play scape that we took to calling the “Big Toy.” The Big Toy had many tubes for crawling and monkey bars for dangling, but my favorite component of it was a glider that you could hang on to and push off with your feet to take you from one side of the Big Toy to the next. Barreling through the air, free and fast, I would pretend to be a flying squirrel, a magical fairy, an adventurer soaring on vines through the jungle, or whatever struck my whimsey.

One day, while flying over a bubbling sea of hot lava as a cave girl, a classmate came rushing carelessly in my path. Vulnerable and out of control, I clamped my eyes shut and prayed for a miss. Unlucky and exposed, he slammed streight into my chest, and my skinny body was flung onto the ground. I tried to cry out, I tried to speak, but my poor little chest couldn’t even breathe. It was the first and only time in my life that the wind was knocked out of me.

Until this Christmas, I had forgotten what getting the wind knocked out of you felt like. My chest became tight and impossible in the aftermath of our family’s Christmas dinner as a nightmarish version of my mother raged while I straightened up her kitchen. For reasons all too unnecessary, my mom had decided that we abandon our fondue to listen as she verbally assaulted my middle brother. Her ridicule went far beyond the realm of the evenings encounters, and her reasoning was buried under years worth of disconnect with her and my brother, as well as her and my brothers father.

This poem was written in exhaustion, without breathing–my chest vulnerable, constricted, and impossible. This is a poem written with love, with hope for my brother.

As always, your comments are welcome, your criticisms are appreciated, and your readership is cherished. Thank you.

_____________________________________________________________________________ Prodigal Son
I am my father’s son.
The soft tap of my pulse
reverberates in his ears
like the steps of an ancient predator.
The patriarchs choice is involuntary.
It is the decision of all who came before him,
the decision of survival:
My death or his exile;
I exist to replace him.
A twisting double helix
ropes around my young and clumsy body-
slithering, seething bondage.
Hacking away at these binds
in a primal bushman frenzy,
I’ve severed my ties to history.
I’ve thwarted the great design.
Panting, I greedily inhale my freedom.
The earth beneath my feet is ripe and welcoming,
the sky above without bounds.
Resting at last, I sink into the warm, familiar cradle of the earth.
My head feels pleasant and heavy upon the gentle slope of her shoulder.
Smelling of tangerine skins, aloe, and rye,
She whispers love into my ear
as she quietly accommodates
the vines of my inheritance
to snake around me once again.

Hello Ladies and Gents! I’m back with a revision of the five minute scene I had requested your assistance with. Your emails and postings were fabulously helpful–thank you!

I have softened the begining to create more of a lighthearted open and a more sympathetic close. Please let me know how this new revision works for you, indulgent reader. I promise, I won’t bore you all with revisions past this drastic one. I only linger with you all so long with this because of the emotional complexity I am trying to pack into 5 minutes. So for those who are in high school, for those who remember it well, for those who study/studied Psycology, for those who are writers—your imput on the realism and emotional pull are most appreciated.

Also, I’d like to thank my most adored critic (sorry to play favorites , sweet readers) by recomending his website to you all. The site features fantasticly beautiful writing.

The address is: www.shaunmanning.com.

Enjoy!

SCENE 1

A suburban high school, 4:00pm. School has ended for the day and SHERI is standing outside the theater, looking at the recent play rehearsal schedule. SHERI wears a floral dress, combat boots, a backpack, and short, brightly dyed hair. Soon, JAMES approaches her. JAMES wears a Mr. Peanut T-shirt and bright green bell-bottoms, a purple scarf, and a pink backpack. He sneaks up from behind her, smacks her butt with his playbook. SHERI isn’t at all surprised.

JAMES
Ola Chica.

SHERI
(Rubbing her now-sore butt)
Hi ass fetish!

JAMES
(Jokingly pinching Sheri’s checks like she is a baby.)
Who’s my Diva? Who is it?

SHERI
Your mamma.

JAMES
I wish!

SHERI
Act two isn’t rehearsing ‘till 5 and I’m hungry like the wolf.

JAMES
(Pretending to make a claw, but it is all too delicate)
Rar!

SHERI
(Laughing and threading her arm through his)
No, not hungry like the sex kitten, hungry like the wolf.

Together, they begin to walk to a set of nearby vending machines in the school lobby. JAMES begins to sing Duran Duran’s “Hungry Like the Wolf.” SHERI joins him and they are soon skipping in a kick-line towards the vending machines, laughing.

A group of five jock guys enters the lobby. They stop their conversation and stand jeering at JAMES and SHERI, who are oblivious to their presence. James breaks away from SHERI and takes his scarf and puts it around his shoulders and shimmies up to Sheri, who is cracking up.

JOCK #1
(Whistling)
Take it off, faggot!

JAMES and SHERI stop their dance, startled. The group of guys laugh even harder. Jock #2 drops his glass juice bottle on the floor. It shatters, and instinctually, without hesitation, he grabs a large shard of glass and chucks it at James’s face. James flinches, and falls to the floor. Sheri is confused. The jocks hush.

SHERI
James?

JAMES
Shit.

James looks up, and from his eyebrow, a gush of blood flows. Sheri gasps and glares accusingly at the group of jocks.

JOCK #3
Lets go!

They take off down the hallway.

SHERI
(Screaming after them, red faced)
What the hell do you think you are doing!?! Come here you freaking assholes!

JAMES
Sheri, shut up. I’m fine.

SHERI
(Still screaming after them)
Don’t think for a goddamned second that you are getting away with this! I’m going to kill you, you filthy shit mongrels!

James lets out an unexpected chuckle, startling Sheri.

SHERI
(To James)
What?

JAMES
(Softly laughing)
Shit mongrel?

SHERI
Stop laughing!

JAMES
(Blotting away his blood with a Kleenex)
Let them go.

SHERI
(Crying)
Screw you.

JAMES
(Joking)
Pretty please?

SHERI
It’s not funny.

JAMES
Okay shit mongrel.

Despite herself, Sheri laughs through her tears.

JAMES
Come here.

Sheri goes to her friend, and hugs him. She checks his cut.

SHERI
How can you just let them go?

JAMES
How can’t I?

SHERI
I hate them.

JAMES
Don’t we all.

SHERI
(Touching his hurt eyebrow)
Lets go to the nurses and have this cleaned up.

JAMES
(Looking panicked)
Can you just please do it?

SHERI
(Resigning to the fact)
You aren’t planning on telling anybody.

JAMES
I’m not the crusader you want.

SHERI
(Upset)
It’s not about what I want…

JAMES
(Interrupting, shaken and wrought with
emotion)
I’m not your little pet project. I just can’t…

James breaks down crying.

SHERI
Look-I was just trying to help! Excuse me for being a friend!

They sit in silence for a time. JAMES face is set in an impenetrable expression. Only the soundless tears that run down his face betray his emotion. He lets his blood drip from his brow without even putting a hand to it. SHERI searches his face and is softened.

SHERI
(Soothing)
Hey. Okay. All right.

Beat.

SHERI
Our Act is up soon.

JAMES
Yeah.

From her backpack, she retrieves tissues, a bottle of water, and a makeup bag. She dab some water from the bottle onto a tissue.

SHERI
(Blotting the wet tissue onto his eye)
Tilt your head back.

James does, as Sheri cleans away all the blood. James lets quiet tears roll down his cheeks. Sheri wipes them away, and takes James head in her hands.

SHERI
(Singing)
I feel pretty, oh so pretty. I feel pretty and witty and gay!

JAMES
Oh do I ever.

SHERI
Shhh. Shut up so I can make you beautiful.

Sheri begins to apply some powder to his cut, and under his puffy, tear streaked eyes.

JAMES
Lets remember to laugh about this when we’re famous some day.

SHERI
Of course.

Sheri continues to apply the makeup, as we fade to black.

I thought it would be a fun exercise in short form screenwriting to try my hand at a five minute scene. I am still working on a title, and I am open to any title suggestions from my gracious readers. This work is formatted incorrectly for a screenplay, I realize, but my copy/paste function wouldn’t allow me to properly maintain my formatting. Again, if anyone has feedback on how to do this sucessfully, please let me know. Otherwise, bear with me. I’d like to shoot this in two weeks when I travel to my hometown to visit family. I’d appreiate any feedback before the script is committed to video. As always, thanks for reading. Enjoy!
______________________________________________________________________

SCENE 1

A suburban high school, 3:40pm. School has ended for the day and JAMES and SHERI are sitting on the floor in the hallway, outside of the theater. Their backpacks, coats, and books are sprawled out about them in a comfortable mess. SHERI wears a floral dress, combat boots, and short, brightly dyed hair. JAMES wears an un-tucked black dress shirt and jeans. They are rehearsing John Guare’s One Act play, Four Baboons Adoring the Sun. Sheri reads from the playbook book as James concentrates on his memorization.

SHERI
(Reading from the playbook)
“Grief is like love. It makes us do terrible things. Say terrible things.”

JAMES
(Hesitating, then defeated.)

I forget. Fuck.

SHERI
(Jokingly pinching James’s checks like he is a baby.)

Who’s my Diva? Who is it?

JAMES
Your mamma.

SHERI
I wish!

(They are quiet for a time.)

SHERI
James, you are going to do great. Everybody knows you are ten times better than Nick Sutter.

JAMES
Then why didn’t I just get the part? What’s with all the callbacks?

SHERI
Smith is a masochist.

JAMES
What director isn’t? It doesn’t matter anyway. We will be out of this hellhole in two years.

SHERI
And then we shall be rich and famous and everyone will shrivel up and die of jealousy!

JAMES
…And stupid Nick Sutter will still be working at the car wash, reliving his pathetic days as a high school drama queen.

SHERI
(Quickly standing up to mimic Nick Sutter at the car wash. She mimes Nick leaping into the path of a car coming out of the wash, ready to dry it. She flashes jazz hands and does a little kick line, as she belts out her dialogue like it is a show tune.)

Hey big boy! Can I towel you off? I live to dry cars!

(James laughs, and stands to join her dramatic mockery. He takes his scarf, and pretends it is a wet towel as he snaps it at Sheri’s behind. They ad lib as they begin a small chase, giggling manically. A group of five jock guys enters the lobby, and stand jeering at James, who is oblivious to their presence. James takes his scarf and puts it around his shoulders and does a shimmy dance to Sheri, who is cracking up.)

JOCK #1
(Whistling)
Take it off, faggot!

(The group of jocks laughs even harder, and as they do, Jock #2 drops his glass juice bottle on the floor. It shatters, and instinctually, without hesitation, he grabs a large shard of glass and chucks it at James’s face. James flinches, and falls to the floor. Sheri is confused. The jocks hush.)

SHERI
James?

JAMES
Shit.

(James looks up, and from his eyebrow, a gush of blood flows. Sheri gasps and glares accusingly at the group of jocks.)

JOCK #3
Lets go!

(They take off down the hallway.)

SHERI
(Screaming after them, red faced)
What the hell do you think you are doing!?! Come here you freaking assholes!

JAMES
Sheri, shut up. I’m fine.

SHERI
(Still screaming after them)
Don’t even think for a goddamned second that you are getting away with this! I’m going to kill all of you, you filthy shit mongrels!

(James lets out an unexpected chuckle, startling Sheri.)

SHERI
(To James)
What?

JAMES
(Softly laughing)
Shit mongrel?

SHERI
Stop laughing!

JAMES
(Blotting away his blood with a Kleenex)
Let them go.

SHERI
(Crying)
Screw you.

JAMES
(Joking)
Pretty please?

SHERI
It’s not funny.

JAMES
Okay shit mongrel.

(Despite herself, Sheri laughs through her tears.)

JAMES
Come here.

(Sheri goes to her friend, and hugs him. She checks his cut.)

SHERI
How can you just let them go?

JAMES
How can’t I?

SHERI
I hate them.

JAMES
Don’t we all.

SHERI
(Touching his hurt eyebrow)
Lets go to the nurses and have this cleaned up.

JAMES
(Looking panicked)
Can you just please do it?

SHERI
(Resigning to the fact)
You aren’t planning on telling anybody.

JAMES
I’m not the crusader you want.

SHERI
(Upset)
It’s not about what I want…

JAMES
(Interrupting, shaken and wrought with
emotion)
It’s about you being some crusader, because it’s easy for you, because your straight, and pretty, and a girl so no one will ever bother you like they do me. It’s a lot easier for you to stand up for guys like me, than to be a guy like me because at the end of the day, you don’t have to live with it. You walk away, to your normal life and don’t have to deal with the consequences like I do. I am not a charity case. I’m not your little pet project. I just can’t…

(James breaks down crying. )

SHERI
(Soothing)
Hey. Okay. All right.

They sit in silence for a time.

SHERI
Your audition is soon.

JAMES
Yeah.

(Sheri digs in her backpack, and retrieves tissues, a water bottle, and a makeup bag. She dab some water from the bottle onto a tissue.)

SHERI
(Blotting the wet tissue onto his eye)
Tilt your head back.

(James does, as Sheri cleans away all the blood. James lets quiet tears roll down his cheeks. Sheri wipes them away, and takes James head in her hands. )

SHERI
(Singing)
I feel pretty, oh so pretty. I feel pretty and witty and gay!

JAMES
Oh do I ever.

SHERI
Shhh. You are going to get this role. Now shut up, so I can make you beautiful.

Sheri begins to apply some powder to his cut, and under his puffy, tear streaked eyes.

JAMES
Lets remember to laugh about this when we’re rich some day.

SHERI
Okay. We will.

Sheri continues to apply the makeup, as we fade to black.

As I learn more about this saucy little world we call blogging, I feel free to post even my most draft-est of works. Thanks to the members of the audiobiographical blogring, I am inspired to do just that.

The following poem was a flourish of words that emerged after an outing with my mentee (I mentor at a local community organization). The experince was so painful and sad that I couldn’t formulate complete sentences, or construct a essay or narrative form that is more typical of my writing.

So, you must understand, I am not a poet. All the more reason for me to post and get the feedback of my indulgent readers. So, please, critique your heart out, spare me nothing, and most importantly reader, enjoy yourself.

Two girls waiting

This is a poem
For all the never-there-fathers
And the stupid mothers
who somehow,
always come back
to belive in them.

Together, in a tangle
of late night growling fights,
afternoon rampages
divorces and
yet still…

SHOCKED
when daddy fucks up again.

Together–
they make the “eager-to-please”
girls, the
girls who wait in the dark
uncomfortable, hungry, tired,
cold
waiting for a ride
from their daddy
who never arrives.
“Twenty minutes”
grows into hours
Two
Please-Love-Me
Never-Complain girls
wait
as the night stretches on without his presence
as the dark sky rumbles
and rain falls
down past tall city buildings
and onto the faces of
Two
Always-Patient Girls

The world hinges on us
Never-Expect-Much girls
us
Please-And-Thank-You girls
us
girls
who say
“It’s no big deal,”
when they stand worried,
finally calling someone else for a ride.

A man with bugging eyes
and coifed hair like a plaster Jesus
stands close.
He tells us that a man named Freddy and him
were sodimized by Satan himself.
He and Freddy used to speak english
but they’ve been talkin’ in tounges ever since.

Two frightened girls watch him as
the last bus rolls by
They wonder
what kind of judgement they have
that would get them here
waiting on a man called dad.

“Nobody loves me,”
the younger Forgive-And-Forget girl says.
I am quiet when I hug her.

Why can’t I just tell her,
“He might not. And that ass hole is missing out!”
What is that hole in your heart
feeling
that comes from such a brutal truth?

What is that powerr of patriarchy,
that need to be help up by Him–
that makes us wait, stone faced and afraid
as jittery junkies and
pretty prostitutes
pass our expectant gaze,
towards every car that passes,

hoping each set of headlights
belongs to you.

So this is blogging! Glorious. To say this is my first time would be a lie, abut a tiny one. You see, I had posted a stupid, smarmy, silly little jingle of an entry yesterday. That was the true loss of my blogging virginity. Embarressed, as those who loose their actual virginity in an embarressing way (hymen breaking via the tragically misguided use of mom’s jumbo tampon to remedy one’s first period), I am using the ever-so-beloved “edit” function to re-create my “first time.” Lets just sweep the former entry/hymen perforation under the rug in favor of a more pleasant, honest, and real experince, shall we?

First off, I’m not always the best at making new friends, or revealing myself (A breif note on the term “revealing myself.” I don’t mean “revealing myself” in a trench-coat-flasher type of way. I’m actually quite good at that. In this context I’m referring to intimacy. *Dear reader, moving forward, please beware of my stunning use of sarcasm and wit*). Sometimes this inability to confidently befriend causes me to tell stupid lies. Although, when I tell these mistruths, I am knawed apart by the guilt of it, and tell the person that I’ve lied to that I’ve done so moments later. This causes me to either be loved for being so human, or shunned for being weird. I hope, as a blog reader, you will choose the former.

I guess it would be helpfull for you to know the kind of lies I tell. People always like to hear the dirty bits of people’s lives (myself included), so I’ll indulge you.

Lie #1: I am 23

I’m actually 22. I’ll be 23 in March. I like to round my age up. I attribute this lie to my constant involvement with things that I am “too young for,” as this age lie started when I was 19, in college, and married. Yes, ladies and gents, MARRIED! >Gasp!<

Let me explain. I am not married in the “insitution-conventional-unfeminist-trapped” kind of way that we are all too framilliar with from growing up with parents in such relationship nightmares, but rather the mind-opening, free, supportive, reinventing-the-doomed-convention, full of acceptance and grace kind of way (please don’t confuse this with being a swinger–I haven’t the balls or coping mechanisms for such things). I like the term “life-partner” better than husband (yick). Marraige was an afterthought for me–spending my life with this person is as natural as breathing.

Of course, public outrage was emense. I was host to my own personal shock and awe campaign that forced people to drop any knowledge of social ediquite and blurt out such insults as, “ARE YOU PREGNANT?” Other favorites included, “HOW OLD ARE YOU?!?!” and, “Are you like, religious?” 

Reactions such as these from new aquaintences brought out my sassy side. Classic responses from me included, “Well, the baby turned 3, and we thought it was about time,” and, “How else do you expect me to keep my greencard?,” or a nonshalont, “Oh, don’t worry, he’ll be dead soon!” While hillarious (hillarious to me and to you, indulgent reader), these lies were mean and diddn’t help my social standing. 

As you can see, it was easer for me to be 21 when I was 19. Upon the disclosure of my significant other, the reactions tended to be much less suvere when I was “21.” Thus, when I was “21,” I told less grossly crewel and endlessly sassy lies, which was important to me as my new husband and I had just moved to Chicago and I was trying to make friends at my new college.

When I actually did turn 21, the lie stopped.While I sometimes have to remind myself not to lie about this, I am confident enough to just be my shocking-old self. Besides, people who were close to me were getting confused. My own mother-in-law had to ask her son, “She’s how old this year?”

Lie #2: I am Shy, Quiet, and “Sweet”

Sometimes, social situation make me nervous. This is a new development since I started college. Even since graduating college, my social insecurity has clung to me with its gross sweaty palms. I’m doing my damndest to get rid of it, but at times, it causes me to act like someone other than who I am. Lately, the charachter I become in uncomforatble social situations seems to be a quiet, shy charachter or a smart/dryly intellectual girl. Due to the 1950′s-Apple Pie composition of my face, many people make the mistake of assuming that I am “sweet.” As defining factors, all of these things are lies.  

I am completely off the wall, with a loud, disturbing, sexual, and disgusting sense of humor. I like to laugh and I have a big smile. I am always craving to listen to other people’s stories and it is emensly gratifying for me to help people, as they tend to open up and tell you these stories. I am a total dreamer. I am a chronic story gatherer. I am in love with those I love, for better or worse (hi dad). My heart is stubbornly sewn onto my sleve, and no matter how hard I try to unstich it, my subconcious always comes along with a staple gun to make sure it is irremovably in place. My face betrays me with its sincerity.   

Well, it looks like I’ve got to get back to work. Thank you, my endearing reader. I feel lucky for you to have read. Don’t feel too shy to comment. It would be my pleasure to read your thoughts.