Maybe it’s because my father played the piano while I was living in my mom’s belly. Maybe that’s why. He serenaded her on their first date. Music lived in his fingers, and it lulled me to sleep when I didn’t yet know what sleep was. I have cassettes that start with my giggly toddler voice introducing my dad as a great piano player. And then a full SIDE A of him scooting his digits over the keys. I don’t remember what I did while he played. I imagine myself bored or making my He-Man dolls fondle Barbies, but maybe I loved watching his fingers. Maybe I listened then, and maybe that’s why any bit of piano makes me weak now.

(Sidenote: Check out this photo. I was a baby pianist. Note the ‘A Chorus Line’ song book. I mean… I definitely acknowledge my mom for not listening to stereotypes, but ‘A Chorus Line?’ That’s a pretty gay bunch of show tunes. I’m surprised I didn’t see that when I was two and tell my mom he was gay [inner side note: My dad was gay. It was a surprise.] [inner side note #2: I look horrible in overalls.].)

There is a pianist I love now who plays down my street. He makes me think. He rolls his heavy wooden piano onto the Venice Boardwalk every single day . He puts out a tip jar, but I’m not sure he plays as much for money as he does for pleasure. He wears a dirty white ponytail and a collared shirt, and he plays. He plays into the night. I see him when I get a morning coffee, and I see him when I take a stroll at dusk. He plays, hunched, letting notes free into the sky. And I can’t walk past him without bursting into tears. No matter what! I’ll walk with my back to him, but his notes pierce my ears, and out come the tears. Sometimes I sit in the grass next to him because I like crying and I like knowing he’s there. And there I’ll stay while salty drops drip into my coffee.

I sob and I can’t help it.
I’ve tried to analyze why these tears jump out of my eyes like Olympic divers. Like lemmings. Like ants. They crawl all over me.
At first I thought the pianist reminded me of my dad.
And I felt sorry for myself. I imagined how many songs my father’s fingers would know by now. But that wasn’t it. So, I stopped feeling sorry for myself.

The more I see this man and the more I cry, the more I realize it has nothing to do with my past or my dad or me at all.

I can’t stop my tears simply because it is so moving to watch someone do something he truly loves. Not for money (he doesn’t even notice when people give tips!). Not for recognition. But for love. This guy loves playing the piano. I don’t know him, but I know that. I see that. I see it in how he breathes out notes. I see it with my eyes closed. In the air. In his songs. Even the blades of grass know it, as I drown them in my tears.

Surrounded by men who hold signs asking for weed money or men who walk around in Speedos for picture money, this man has found a venue for an art that he has mastered out of love. And it makes me cry.

It was my birthday week! I was over here getting older. What were you doing?
I didn’t write anything, although I do have some new insights about age (hint: it’s not so bad).

In the meantime, I will share this Taboo Tale with you from our February show. It’s about a virgin in her thirties. Remember how I got so mad with conservatives last week and wrote that everyone is fucking (I got some complaints about my over-usage of the F word. Sorry. It’s just a word!!!)? Well, I guess I was wrong. This chick is not fucking, at least not in her ‘bathing suit area.’

Regardless of religion or politics, I think we can all agree that humans are animals. I’m not saying we evolved from chimps. I’m simply saying we are alive. We have to eat and shit to stay alive. We have body hair. Sometimes we don’t smell good. When we strip away our brand names, electronic devices, and double ovens… we’re not that different from dogs. Or monkeys. Or llamas. We are animals. We just happened to have been the first ones to grow attached to a telephone or a toilet or living under roofs. Still, we are animals.

Humans are animals.
And animals have sex.

Dogs do it so much in front of humans that we’ve copied them. I’ve seen frogs do it. I’ve seen flies do it mid-air. And it’s often acceptable for humans IN MOVIES to have sex. But when it comes to regular people, it has become part of our culture to deny our sexual endeavors.

I felt compelled to write about fucking when I opened the news the other day. It was filled with articles whose subtexts were brimming with sex. The pope has told nuns they can’t support women who’ve fucked. Some fella with a microphone called women who want birth control sluts. Catholic organizations are pissed they need to give birth control to their employees, who they assure us are not fucking before marriage. Parents don’t want to give the HPV vaccine to their non-fucking teens. A man who wants to be the president of our country will end aid to Planned Parenthood because only bad people who fuck need help with sexual health. And everyone is up in arms because some secret service agents got fucked in Colombia (I’m only upset about the haggling. Come on, dude. Just pay the lady.).

If aliens read our news, they’d think we were really repressed and using news outlets as the only way to talk about sex.

And maybe we are. The majority of people in the news are claiming that nobody is having sex, and if they are, it’s only once in a while to procreate normally with their beloved partners. They’re saying that only bad people really need birth control or HPV vaccines or prostitutes or to help anyone who has ever had an unwed penis near their vaginal cavity (or vice versa, but the news really seems to hate on women).

I just want to remind everyone here once again: WE ARE ANIMALS.
Sex is part of our animal instinct. We’ve been able to push down our natural instinct to walk around naked, but we haven’t gotten rid of our urge to fuck. And we won’t. Because it’s part of our animal lives. It is in our DNA. Our basic skills. Our natural body makeup. We are supposed to fuck. That’s just how it is. Of course sex was originally meant for procreation, but extra bedrooms have grown expensive and nobody really wants 18 babies anymore. Still, the animal urge is there and we all want to fuck. And that’s okay.

I don’t recommend we all just go fuck willy nilly, get pregnant, and have the government pay for our abortions. I’m simply saying that sex is a natural instinct, and we shouldn’t be looked down upon or called sluts just because we’re acting like the animals that we are.

Sometimes, Mr. Pope, I wish we weren’t so animalistic. I wish we weren’t programmed to pro-create so much. I’d like less traffic on the 405. I’d like to not want to fuck every Starbuck’s employee during my monthly hormonal tidal wave. I wish we were all easily programmed to have really passionate sex just once a year like those turtles that lay eggs on a beach like clockwork. That way we could plan for the special night. We’d only have to remove leg hair once a year, and pregnancy scares would happen all together. But we’re not that kind of animal. WE ARE THE OTHER KIND. We’re like lions and tigers. We roar. We scratch (depending). We even do some other weird shit we pick up from our childhoods that we would never tell anyone about. It’s because we are programmed to do so. We are programmed to get horny, see another person, and want to fuck them. It is a natural part of life. What I’m saying is: IT’S OKAY TO FUCK. And everybody is doing it.

Yes, Mr. Pope, I’m sorry to break it to you: WE ARE ALL FUCKING.
Women are fucking. Gay people are fucking. Secret service agents are fucking. People who aren’t married are fucking. Teens are fucking. Our parents are fucking. Teachers are fucking. Even Republicans are fucking. (note: okay, some people aren’t fucking, but that’s because they’re on depression meds, adhere to strict religious code, secretly hate their husbands, have lost their libidos, are old and sick of fucking, or are just waiting for the ‘right guy’ and dying inside [someone I know])

Don’t be alarmed. It’s okay. We were born to hump. I see what you conservative people are doing. Denying is meant to be coy. But look what happens when you deny: Larry Craig. Priests. Anthony Wiener (and the many other texting wieners). It is not working to pretend we’re not having sex. It doesn’t make us seem cute. It makes us seem like liars. It makes us look naive. And prude. The more we deny, the more people assume we’re hiding something. Most people probably think the Santorums have a sex den full of minors in their basement.

Let it out. It’s okay. WE ARE SUPPOSED TO FUCK. Because we are animals. It’s okay to have a sexual appetite. It’s okay to want to have sex before marriage. It’s okay to masturbate, fantasize, do it like dogs, and take birth control pills. Get over it. Stop being so prude. Enjoy an orgasm once in a while.

Be an animal.

(before)

I haven’t spent more than twenty dollars on an item of clothing since 2008. Or even before that. Or pretty much ever. I think my prom dress was $300, and I still feel guilty about it (Sorry, Mom). I’m not thrifty because I’m writing a clever book on saving money. I don’t have a secret blog about my money diet. I just have problems spending money.

I wouldn’t say I’m cheap. I’ll donate to your cause if you ask me. I’ll buy you dinner if we go out (if we’re at Sizzler or Portillo’s). I love splurging on Christmas gifts. But when it comes to myself, I do not spend money. I save on underwear by not wearing any. I never get my hair cut. I eat Subway a lot for dinner. I know how to sacrifice. I must have spent a previous life as a Holocaust victim (Surely forgoing brand name denim is just like what the Jews went through).

One of my courses in psychology school is about self-nurturing. We’re supposed learn how to love ourselves and shit. So, we HAVE to do nice things. Just for ourselves! It’s a requirement. I haven’t yet bought any good clothes (because gross. I hate shopping), but I did splurge on something.

I hired a maid.

I felt guilty about it at first. I mean, who can’t take a few minutes every week to wipe up the bathroom? ME! I can’t take a few minutes every week to wipe up the bathroom. Or fold my clothes after I do laundry. It’s ME! I come home late from my freelance job where I do important things like coin soon-to-be famous phrases on infomercials. Then I go to my flamenco class. Then I write jokes for Taboo Tales. Then I bla bla bla. And all of a sudden, my entire apartment looks like it’s my high school room minus the Kirk Cameron poster. In 2012 alone, I’ve uttered the phrases “I can’t live like this.” and “How do they do it?” over two zillion times.

And so I broke through my guilt and mentioned to a friend that I was shamefully thinking of hiring someone to clean my place, a one-bedroom apartment that can probably fit in your apartment.

That opened the floodgates. That day, I learned that everyone in LA has a maid. THAT is how they do it. I will probably be shot for this because the rule here is: DO NOT TALK ABOUT YOUR MAID unless you are sure you’re talking to someone else who has a maid.

Everyone has a maid (except people who don’t yet know that everyone has a maid). Everyone is really good at not talking about their maids. As soon as I expressed interest, I was invited into the secret maid society. I got tips from maid pros:

“Before you take someone’s maid recommendation,” one friend said, “go to their house and slide your finger along the base of the toilet. Ya know. Just to see.”

“Your maid will go through a peacock phase and then start to get lazy,” another friend said. “After a year, she won’t clean any better than you do.”

“Don’t pay more than fifty. You can get a maid for thirty bucks on Craigslist.”

Thirty bucks! To wipe up the base of my toilet? Isn’t that illegal?
It turns out, YES, it is illegal. Still, everyone has a maid.

I never went to my friend’s house to check his toilet, but I used his recommendation. And in a jiffy, Pati was at my house. I thought she’d be impressed because I’d already cleaned. I made my bed to show her who was boss. I shoved a rag around my bathtub to convince her I’d cleaned it more than that one time. I had an inkling she might just show up and tell me not to waste my money on her.

Nope. She showed up and let out a squeal when she saw the tub. It turns out, the bathtub is not supposed to be lined with black mold. What I thought might be an hour-long session lasted SIX HOURS. She made love to my apartment. She caressed it with foams and bleaches. She vacuumed my toaster. She soaked the shelves of my refrigerator. SHE VACUUMED MY TOASTER.

She charged me eighty dollars to clean for six hours. I wanted to pay her my soul.

My apartment is once again reminiscent of my adolescent hovel, but for those few days that followed, I felt wonderful. I felt free to frolic in the germless wonder of my one-bedroom. I spread out on the floor. I rolled around in my sparkly tub. I toasted several clean breads. And I realized that it does feel good to do things for myself. It feels really good. I’m pretty sure it’s all downhill from here. Be warned. I’m going to be a person who has a maid and talks about that maid. Because I fucking deserve it. But, please, if I start bragging about my new Prada bag, do something.

There’s something weird about mother-daughter relationships. Daughters often say they don’t want to be like their mothers. Mothers often cultivate an obsession with buying their daughters clothing from Kohl’s.

There are usually fights. Sometimes eye rolls. Plenty of complaining.
My theory is that both moms and daughters live on the fence: Daughters want their moms to both leave them alone and take care of them. Mothers want their daughters to be both autonomous and do what they say.

It usually ends up in some outburst on a major holiday.

My mom and I have been through that.
In high school, I convinced myself that the main problem in our relationship was that my mom had low self-esteem. So, I did what you should always do to a person with low-self-esteem: I told her every day how embarrassed she should be about having low self-esteem. I hadn’t yet learned about projections, which is when you see in others what you really feel about yourself (Thanks, psych school). I guess I had low self-esteem. I’m not sure how I didn’t realize that as I stuffed my bras and gave away my lunch money to popular kids (Nick Pope, you owe me at least twenty-three dollars in quarters).

It’s been a ride, this whole relationship thing. But we magically got to a place where I’m not judging her anymore. And she no longer answers the phone, “Didn’t I already talk to you this week?”
It took a while though! Junior high and high school weren’t the best, as my self-esteem got lower and my judgments of my mother got more abundant. That’s why it was a big deal that I wrote her an ode last year for Father’s Day. It’s RIGHT HERE! You know how you do something one day and you like it, but you look back at it another day and you think it could be so much better? That’s how I feel about that ode. There are so many other things to say about my mom besides that she taught me to think farts are funny. Still… out of this entire blog (which is pretty damn huge since I started it in 2008 [first post ever here, which mentions my mom. AH! Am I the kind of person that always talks about my mom?]), the live theater show, Blogologues, chose that entry to perform ON STAGE in NY right now. They’re doing a run IN NYC from now until May 5th. An ode to my momma ON STAGE! How cool is that? Mom, does this make up for that self-esteem thing?

Who wants to come see it with me?!!! I’ll be there April 28th at 8pm. Tickets and info are here: Blogologues! YAY!!!!!! Happy early Mothers Day.

My great aunt died last week.

Beverly Jean Gedda Harper.

She was an observer. A quiet smiler. A believer. I didn’t see her too often, but I wish I had. She was a peaceful keeper of so many answers I didn’t even know I wanted.
Her husband and her brother died in a camping accident. Her daughter had polio. Her son died before coming home from the hospital. What was all that like? I wish I’d asked.
She never gave a hint that she lived in that past. Life! She still laughed. She still lived on surrounded by family. Every time I saw her, she’d smile this wondrous smile, as if to say, ‘Can you believe this shit?’

It’s in my genes that smile.

My grandma, Beverly’s sister, was a notorious trickster. There was always a fake puke somewhere in our house when she lived there. Or a fake fly in a fake ice cube in someone’s drink. And, of course, the Whoopie cushion. Always a Whoopie cushion.

My family is my family. And they’re the best family I’ve ever had.
And the weirdest part: Lots of them are dead.
Yeah.
My dad. All my grandparents. Dead! Dead! Dead!

Some people have gone through their lives without experiencing death. They have young parents who last forever. I’ve understood death since fourth grade when I saw that funny grandma who looked funnier than usual as she lie in a box wearing the dress she only used for special occasions. I personally thought she looked better in housecoats. I STILL miss sitting on her lap.

And then my grandpa died. And my father. And my other grandma. And then a friend. And then more friends. At least ten people from my high school class have all left the earth. Most by drugs. Some by car accidents. A few suicides.

All these people I used to know.

So many deaths! They are a vivid reminder that, SHIT, we are all going to die! AH! I mean, in a hundred years, you guys won’t be reading this. There won’t even be computers. Hopefully not blogs. Probably no more outside. Definitely no more laughing. And we’re all gonna be dead. ALL OF US! Sorry. I don’t mean to be a spoiler, but WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE. Sometimes, usually when I’m taking a bath, I think about my one-day heyday as a vibrant senior citizen. Or my legacy as the World’s Oldest Person Who Writes about Vaginas. And then how I will one day no longer exist. AT ALL! It’s so weird. Yet feels good to know I’ll be leaving such an imprint on society with my vagina.
But I try not to think about that stuff. Because it’s better to just live. And not take baths.

You had a good heyday, Auntie Bev! I’ll ask you those questions one day.

I don’t know how a writer knows when she’s reached the pinnacle of her career, but I’m pretty sure I have. I have written what some might call an opus, what others might call an embarrassment, and what most might call…

an infomercial.

Yeah.
I have.

At my current place of freelance work, I was tasked with the assignment to sell a workout plan. They disguised it as an “informational promo video,” but I knew what they meant. We all knew what they meant as we stared at the floor and twiddled our pens. Some people nodded and pretended to think of a creative way to sell a workout plan. I started thinking of what phrases I could use. “Real results,” “Melt off the weight,” “Menu options.” I’m proud to admit the client bought MY script. You guys, I sold a script in Hollywood. It happens to be an infomercial script, but STILL. It includes some women talking about how they’ve lost 25 pounds. AND… a new term that nobody has ever heard before that I totally made up: red carpet body.

Have the women in my video lost twenty-five pounds? I don’t know. I don’t even know if any women have ever tried such a workout plan. But there they are in my script wearing tank tops and showing off their red carpet bodies.

Am I going to hell? Maybe.

Am I simply on the path to ‘real writer’ and taking any assignment necessary so that I don’t feel like a liar when I say I’m a writer even though an infomercial script is hardly considered ‘writing?’ Yes.

In other news, there’s a show in NY called Blogologues, and it brings ‘stuff from the interwebs’ to the stage. They chose THIS HERE BLOG to be showcased on their stage! IN NEW YORK (where Broadway is!)! Two talented actresses acted out this entry of my blog in New York. I’d like to point out that there are no menu plans or red carpets in that entry. That kind of makes me a real writer, right? Write? (Am I a real writer if I use ‘write’ instead of ‘right’ for dramatic effect?)

In more other news, I have a BOOK COMING OUT. Kinda. Not really a book of my own, but a book that my words are in! It’s an anthology called Dancing at the Shame Prom, and it’s a collection of stories from women who’ve learned that talking about our issues releases them. The back of the book says, “Shame is a powerful thing. It can weigh on your heart and mind, diminish your sense of self-worth, and impact the way you live in the world. But what happens when you share that secret burden?”

You can pre-order it on Amazon and everything! They don’t list me as a writer on Amazon because I don’t have a big enough ‘name.’ But STILL. That kinda means I’m a real writer. RIGHT? WRITE?

In even OTHER news, I went to a writers’ conference where I met with a bunch of agents and editors. I shook hands powerfully, made eye contact, and tried hard to make self-deprecating jokes that made me seem humble yet full of self-worth. Some very important people read my words and told me how to get published in a way that Amazon might credit me for my words. I did not tell them about my “promotional video.” At the end of the conference, I won the editor’s choice award from an agent at Simon and Schuster. She called my writing ‘gorgeous and poignant.’ Huzzah.

I saw her afterward and gave her a hug. She said something like, “You won because the quality of writing at this year’s conference was pretty low.”

But STILL! I will take it. I will take it because it makes writing about red carpet bodies seem irrelevant.

In even OTHER news, I wrote a Taboo Tale with some girls. I’m pretty proud of it:

Writing is what I most love to do. I can sometimes only think with my hands. Trying to get someone to believe that I’m a good writer is the pits though. It shouldn’t matter what others think, but if I ever want to stop writing about red carpet bodies, it’s a necessity. Dangit.

People ask me why I’m busy all the time. It’s because I’m over here TRYING! Man alive. I am trying and trying and trying. And sometimes not sleeping. And many times forgetting where I am or to change my clothes or to breathe. And in the meantime, I’m grasping onto the patience that is only slightly balanced atop the dream of giving up, moving to the suburbs, and popping out a kid in a station wagon (I’m a fan of alternative births). All while I’m writing about weight loss. But I am sure the day will come. That’s what happens when you don’t give up. Right? WRITE?

You better not change the channel when you see my information promo video!
See you in hell.

Do cops get frustrated because we’re always driving really slowly in front of them?

Am I pathetic for feeling really sorry for MySpace, pay phones and Luke Perry?

Why hasn’t someone invented a word that rhymes with orange? I REALLY WANT TO WRITE A POEM ABOUT ORANGES.

Would anyone actually read a poem I wrote about oranges?

Why do some bald guys look so hot and others like eggs?

Aren’t parrots just gay pigeons?

What is non-dairy creamer, why doesn’t it need to be refrigerated, and will it give me cancer?

Did everyone else’s mom eat those in the 90s?

Along with Melba toasts?

Do certain foods remind you of certain times?

What ever happened to Chef Boyardee?

I cannot believe I ate that shit.

Real chefs don’t really wear hats like that, right?

What’s the point of those hats?

Why the poofy part?

Where do aborted baby fetuses go?

Do trees feel naked without leaves?

If you trade something for the world, isn’t that thing also part of the world anyway? It’s kinda cheating.

Is yogurt really alive? How alive?

Does yogurt talk shit about me to other yogurt in my stomach?

Or not that alive?

What does it mean when people say they can tell I’m an only child?

Can they tell that I like to sit alone in my apartment and ask myself questions while nodding to myself about laser hair removal and almonds?

Or is it something else?

If it’s an insult, fuck you guys.

If it’s a compliment: Hey, thanks!

Why are you reading this when you could be defining the word ‘glorange?’

Did you know I started asking questions about TWO years ago HERE? And  HERE?

I have an unhealthy relationship with Facebook. Sometimes I think, “Wow. A chick from high school algebra ran a marathon!” And other times, I’m like, “Who are these people?”

I don’t mean to brag, but… I have a lot of friends on Facebook. Yep. I’m THAT cool. I happen to have lived in lots of cities, and I don’t say ‘no’ to someone who wants to be my friend. I’m too codependent to hurt someone’s feelings, and that’s just mean: No, I don’t want to be your friend even though it only entails NEVER seeing you ever. There are the comedians I meet after shows who hear me talk about my vagina on stage. There are the people in advertising who post ads they’ve made. There are my spiritual friends who post about chakras and moon cycles. And then there are my high school friends. Lots of them post about their kids, going clubbing in Chicago, or Farmville. My feed is schizophrenic.

The moon is in its seventh ray.

I just bought an imaginary cow!

This casting sesh is, like, so boring.

My root chakra is singing.

Look at my kids!

Look at my wedding!

I’m depressed. Come to my comedy show.

Sometimes, late at night, I find myself checking in on people from my high school. I get all Sliding Doors and wonder what I would be like had I never left Addison (dubbed the blandest suburb of Chicago by ‘The Onion.’). I love seeing the arcs of the lives I didn’t live.

A post came up the other day from a guy I used to think was ‘the cutest.’ He was, like, totally popular. A direct quote:

Why is it every time I go to walmart there is a fucking bomb tosser in the parking lot that can’t walk an extra 17 feet and has to wait for the closest spot. Not to mention the fact that it takes 47 seconds for them to actually get into the spot once it’s open! (no offense to my bomb tossing fb friends)

This post caught my attention because popular people in my school would never have admitted to a trip to Walmart back in the day. We had Zayre back then and those were NOT cool. I chuckled at how far we have come, at how we no longer care about what we cared SO MUCH about in high school. I exhaled at the calming thought that we’ve all sort of realized there’s no such thing as social hierarchies except in India, Hollywood and on any Real Housewives show. Phew.

The only thing I didn’t get was the bomb tosser reference.

“What’s a bomb tosser?” I replied in the comments with a gust of comment verve that I never usually have. I figured he was in the sporting goods aisle at Walmart by then, so I Googled it.

Oh. According to Urban Dictionary, a Bomb Tosser is “a person of middle eastern decent.”

This blog is the place to learn all about racial slurs. I also went over the term ‘mulanyan’ once HERE (also learned from people in the blandest suburb.).

Then I felt sad. And so much anger. First of all, my town’s population has more Indians than Middle Easterners, so they aren’t even using the correct derogatory terms. HELLO! GET YOUR RACISM RIGHT, jerks.

And then other people commented:

-bomb tosser lol.

-That’s why you should just go to Meijer instead.

GROSS. In that town, it’s acceptable to assume anyone other than Italians are inferior. I’ve already shared about the time when a guy at the town bar asked, ‘What are you?’ and then said ‘sorry’ when I replied ‘Spanish.’

A barrage of rage filled the sausagy links of my brain. I let the memories flood back in. The times when people yelled at me for having ‘jungle fever’ or tore down the wrinkled up ‘Racism Sucks’ poster I kept putting right back up on my wall.

I wanted to cry because people hadn’t changed. Yeah, they were no longer ashamed about getting a discount on dish rags, but they still think it’s okay to call people bomb tossers. How can you make fun of other people when YOU are at WALMART?!

These people make the worst racists.

I couldn’t take it. And I let my fingers type in a comment that I thought was least mean but still made my point:

Oh. Just googled it. So, you’re still racist? I thought people stopped being racist in the 60s. Apparently, not people in Addison. Thank goodness I moved as far away as I could. 

I felt triumphant. There. I showed them. They would all see the error of their thinking RIGHT after they read my comment.

And then someone commented:

Why is it better to get a Muslim sex doll? Because they blow themselves up. 

WHAT?! They hadn’t changed after reading my comment?! I was shocked. They would surely realize how small-minded they were any minute now?

After a few more comments directed at me, I suddenly felt horrible. Not because a set of people were turning their hatred toward me, but because I was being just like them. I was on my own high horse. If they were thinking themselves higher than people who share skin color with a few guys who may have thrown a bomb, then wasn’t I JUST THE SAME for thinking I was better because I’m not racist? Or because I moved away? My own comment even sounded generalizing. I could have even written: no offense to my Addison fb friends.

I AM ONE OF THEM!
I guess we’re all human.

That guy wanted some specific people to change, and I was doing the same. And, guess what? No large group is going to change just because I happen to deem them wrong. How annoying is that?

My rage and my comments weren’t going to change or ‘fix’ anything because those people don’t think they’re broken. And getting mad about it is only causing ME anxiety. I heard that it’s around 30 when people realize they can no longer change the world. Maybe that’s where I’m at. I can only be a good example and that’s it. Getting mad about it doesn’t help. And judging it helps worse. Bah.

So, I leave the Facebook commenting to others. And I’m dropping the judgements of those people. Whatever. Go be racists. Fine. That’s just who you are. To make up for it, I’m going to go have sex with bunch of bomb tossers. I told you I care about others’ feelings. See you on Facebook.

A man crossed the street in front of my car yesterday. Since I was hiding behind my windshield, I had a rare opportunity to stare at him without the possibility of awkward accidental eye contact. He had what some call a FUPA, or Fat Upper Pussy/Penis Area.  It was as if he had a monster truck tire strapped into his underwear, and he had to hobble across the street with a cane in order to carry all that extra weight. I stared without shame and followed his body from the very bottom of his ankles up. And at the top, I saw his face (Obviously. If his face weren’t there, I would have screamed). His huge bottom lip sagged down as if it were pulled by the extra weight of his FUPA. His mouth hung open, surely sloshing fellow pedestrians with uncontrollable drool.

I wanted to run out of my car and talk to this man. I wanted to know what it’s like to grow up with such a FUPA and such an uncontrollable bottom lip. Maybe one day I’ll have a bloated upper pussy area, but today I can frolic joyfully and cane-free through crosswalks and sprinklers. What’s it like not to be able to stand up at will or not drool while walking? What is it like to shop for huge underwear and not be able to go on roller coasters?

And then I thought: Holy shit. Humans are all so different. Here we are, all living these intertwining lives but experiencing such different existences. If I walked with this man around the city and stopped to buy a top hat and a croissant, we’d each come away with such unique experiences even though we bought the exact same hat.

I thought about this all day long.

And then I went to the Korean spa. It’s less of a spa and more of a haven for bodies. It’s where people go to rest their limbs and wash away their sins. Or maybe just their eczema.

The first step at the spa is: get nekked. All naked. Lots of naked.

I LOVE being naked. I prefer to sleep naked. I hate waistbands. I’ve spent entire meetings imagining how much better they would be if I were naked. One day, I will probably be a nudist. But, I wasn’t such a fan of the birthday suit until recently.  I spent plenty of my childhood hating my body and hiding it in sweatpants. I had bow-legged bird legs, but I thought I was fat. I just knew I had cellulite in places I couldn’t see. I wouldn’t say I had an eating disorder, BUT I did weigh my pasta and only eat fat-free devil’s food cakes from Healthy Choice. Remember those? 50 calories each! Maybe I had a slight eating disorder.

In junior high, I would never have imagined I’d be stripping down to prance around with my titties out in front of Korean strangers. I also would never have imagined I’d be living a life that didn’t require inch-long fake nails.

But there I was. Real nails, nude, and soaking in hot, bubbling water with other women whose tits were out– whose everything was out. I marveled at the variety of pubic hair. I marveled at the body sizes and shapes, not one like any body in any magazine. Just real beautiful bodies. Wide bodies. Skinny bodies. Dark bodies. Peachy bodies. Misshapen bodies. Bodies with random hairs in weird places. Bodies with scars. Bodies with boulder boobies. Bodies with crater titties.

A tiny older woman wearing granny panties and a bra (employees get to cover their vaginas) poked out of a hole in the wall and called my number.

My turn.

I lay naked on a padded slab while this woman put on abrasive gloves and scrubbed every inch of my body. Every inch. I’m talkin butt crack. Armpits. The strange unnamed area between my crotch and my leg. She got it. She scrubbed for a good forty minutes, occasionally dousing me with warm water to wash away the mounds of skin that had piled up on the table.

I cannot begin to describe my pride as I lay there with everything out for the world to see. I was proud that I have reached a point where I am not ashamed of my body. And I was proud of how relaxed I was. I could relax! Last year, I could get naked, but I would still have worried about whether or not the employee was judging my leg stubble or staring at the dirt in my bellybutton (I can’t get it out! Not my fault.). I have come a long way. This time, I was so relaxed that I scared myself. I thought it slightly dangerous to lie there so open, so naked, so loose. I imagined all of my organs  falling out through my vagina. Could that happen? Had anyone ever experienced this much naked relaxation before? Maybe I was the first and all my organs would plop right out onto the table. Would the woman just scrub them?

While she loofah-ed my one-day-FUPA area, I stared at all those ladies parading around in their personal glories. I realized that nudity is the great equalizer. I couldn’t tell anyone apart. That is not an Asian joke. Without clothes or phones or cars or ideas to define us, we all look the same. I couldn’t even tell if anyone had a FUPA. We all think our bodies are too fat or too thin or too weird, but when they’re all just chilling together, they’re all the damn same. We are all the same.

Perhaps we’re having slightly different experiences, but I’m pretty sure those experiences are mainly just variations of the same thing. We all want to be loved. We all spend our lives doing things we love and things we don’t love. We suffer. We laugh. We fear. We squeal with joy. We learn stuff, fail, hate ourselves, and hopefully one day learn to love ourselves no matter what. Whether we have a FUPA or a crater tit.

All the same.

[photo credit: Spencer Tunick]