June 2005 Archives

And perhaps he's right. Due to the fact that I signed about 38 non-disclosure agreements, I've chosen to not write about my work life. And since I'm wagering no one wants to hear about how he looks just like Christopher Robin, I'm left with a serious dearth of potential topics.

And really, what it comes down to, is that I hate writing. I once confessed this to my mother (a writer), and she said, "Oh honey, all real writers hate it." After reading a number of biographies and interviews, it turns out that in this case, like so many others, she was lying. Most writers don't appear to hate writing. Many of them seem to enjoy it. They make special rooms dedicated to doing it much like S&M aficionados, and they they spend time each day doing it and reveling in it. Whereas I sit around watching Friends, and dreading the time that I force myself to sit in front of the keyboard, pecking away about things that no one cares about, namely myself.

And I haven't quite figured out why I do it. I decided recently that I would actually submit something I wrote to someone that determines the worth of such things, i.e. an editor. I decided that it was high time I was rejected creatively as well as sexually. What would be only be better than this, was if I could meet an editor who could reject me sexually and creatively at the same time.

"I'm sorry, but your breasts sag and your work is crap," he might growl while ignoring me in favor of a vodka tonic. This fantasy of mine, which grows much more intense over time, is similar to one once expressed by my pal Iris.

"My ideal man would copyedit my love notes and send them back to me," she sighed wistfully once, over dinner. Just thinking about her round cursive hand, nearly eclipsed by his marks correcting her grammatical and semantic errors makes her shudder with delight.

Perhaps overhearing this conversation, my latest fling replied to a pages-long essay I sent him by saying merely, "It's an infidel, not a infidel, Lina." I've since suggested that although this form of foreplay may suffice with Iris, it's not the quickest route into my pants. I guess I should be grateful though, for any minor insult thrown my way which I can use as "material" on my website or in my latest craigslist post about how mean boys are.

My aunt is an actress, and one of my earliest, most traumatizing memories of her was when she invited me to see her in one of her one-woman shows. I was eleven, a fact that was well known to both her and my mother, who accompanied me to the show. This night was a groundbreaking one--it was the first time I heard the term "bestiality."

The show included a scene in which she described being on a subway and thinking lustfully about engaging in sexual intercourse. She proceeded to describe each occupant of the subway car and the acts she would like to perform on or with them.

The scene culminated with her description of screwing the homeless man on the train (with graphic talk of all his scabs). Then the blind man. Then his dog.

I was in the audience. I was eleven.

By the time I was a teenager, sodomy was old hat. I had heard my aunt describing it (while pretending to be a sailor) for years. To music, even, with my uncle singing backup.

When my brother was around eleven, he was taken to one of her shows. Apparently, in my family, eleven is the age of consent, and no subjects are barred once a child reaches that milestone. This time, in front of my horrified brother, my aunt removed her top and proceeded to straddle an audience member and rub her huge black lace brassiere in his face. Unfortunately, these are all the details that have survived, as my brother claims to have blocked out all memories from that night, and from the preceding two weeks as well, just to be safe.

I come from a clothed family. A very clothed family. We aren't nudists, we don't rub sunblock on each other, and we rarely wear sleeveless shirts. This is a fact that upsets my aunt to no end, and it is not uncommon to find her frolicking around the house in a camel-toed swimsuit anytime between May and November.

Sometimes, however, even this thin layer of spandex is too much. Last summer, we were at the beach house, and I was sequestered in my room. I heard the phone ringing in the kitchen and ignored it. It continued to ring, and realizing that I might be the only person not out on the beach, I ran into the kitchen to answer it. There I discovered that my aunt had gotten to it first.

Stark naked.

I ran away as quickly as I could, but not before we made eye contact. I saw her naked and she knew it.

I spent the rest of the day trying to avoid her, or at least her gaze, unsuccessfully. Finally, she approached me and put her hand on my shoulder. "What's the matter Lina?" she asked, not able to comprehend why I couldn't look at her. "I feel like you're mad at me or something. Is something the matter?"

Currently, my younger brother lives with our grandmother. And although he enjoys his duties walking the dog and the constant nagging, he was nonetheless excited when he found out that our grandmother would be gone for the weekend. He was pleased that he would have apartment to himself, and there was a spring in his step when he approached the building.

On opening the apartment door, however, he was confronted with one of the most horrifying sights he had ever seen. Our aunt, who does not maintain a residence there, was lying atop the grand piano.

Better yet, she was wearing a French maid costume complete with a low-cut top, tiny skirt and even tinier apron.

And--it gets better, her legs were spread as wide as she could get them, which, since she's almost six feet tall, is mighty wide.

Best of all, there was a photographer perched on the balcony, taking pictures.

Traumatized, my brother rushed to his room, where he curled in a fetal position and rocked himself slowly back and forth. When that didn't help, he tried pounding his head against the wall, and finally, sensing there were no other options, lost himself in a drunken stupor.

A few days later, I received an email from my aunt. A group email, sent also to my mother, father, brother, and uncle. In it was one of the pictures of her in the famed French maid costume, this time lying on her mother's bed, the same one that her father died in but six months ago.

It took me not more than a glance to ascertain that at least she was wearing panties. I was only able to confirm this due to the fact that they were clearly visible. But at least they appeared to be clean.

My aunt is constantly providing me with material like this. To her, sending the entire family a picture of her fetish photography on her dead father's bed is always a good idea. Like most show folk I have known, my aunt is willing to do just about anything for attention, and perhaps that is why I have until now steadfastly refused to write about her. That and the fact that she reads my webpage on a regular basis. But that picture broke my resolve. As someone who makes a habit of writing about my dysfunctional family, I realize I would be doing a disservice to the public if I were to leave out this crucial part of the story.

So, if you'd like to see my aunt's rack, go check out her new show, Cervix With a Smile.

Having read in all the parenting books published in the late seventies that they should try and include me in the process, they asked me what I thought we should name my new little brother.

"Driveway," I replied, thus setting the stage for our relationship for the next twenty years.

Other than him, I've always been fond of babies. Having been born with wide-set hips, I can't help but coo at babies despite my natural proclivity towards negativity. I make faces at them when their parents aren't looking, and when they cry, I tell them sternly that they have no idea how bad it is going to get.

So when my friends Holly and Rene decided go and get pregnant, I was pretty excited.

My friends have had children before--well, one of my friends had managed to pop two out before the end of high school, and another two by her twenty-first birthday. She was a religious girl, and didn't think that God wanted her to use birth control. Unfortunately, she had skipped the day at Sunday School where they were warned about the injunction against pre-marital sex, probably because she was out boning one of her many older boyfriends.

Eventually, I convinced her that God wanted her to have her tubes tied, and saw her through the process after the birth of her fourth child. I also talked her into giving her son the male spelling of his name rather than the female version she had her heart set upon, and left feeling like my work as a good friend to a new mother was done.

Holly, however, hasn't needed this kind of help. One of her few requests of me during her pregnancy was to learn how to make Bloody Marys so that I could have one waiting for her the minute the baby crawled out. This however, has presented too much of a challenge for me thus far.

Despite my lack of bartending abilities, I'm thrilled about Holly and Rene's new baby. Most babies come out looking smooshed and deformed, leaving one forced to grimace and compliment wildly, hoping that anything might seem plausible. Luckily for me, Baby Rene is a beautiful specimen of a child, from the minute Holly squirted him out.

Recently I was exposed to another set of young parents, who made me thankful for the remarkable amounts of laidbackness and coolness that my friends have shown. This couple had a young person, around the age of four or five. The father of this little boy insisted on talking in baby talk for the entire afternoon that I was there, even when there were no children in the room.

This fellow also insisted on calling his wife's brother, also present, "Uncle Mark," making comments like, "Wud Uncle Mark wike a wittle bit of cheese?" Aunt Lina was considering vomiting, when the young father turned his attention on me.

"So, when are woo going to have a wittle one?" he asked.

"What?" I replied, dumbfounded.

"When are WOO going to have a wittle one?" he repeated, this time gesturing towards his son's toys, which were strewn all over the floor.

Momentarily at a loss for words, I finally muttered, "I'm barren," and left the room to fix myself a drink.

So for now, it seems, I'm going to stick to babysitting, and leave the actual babymaking to my more capable and genetically superior friends.