A Star Is Born

A handsome old friend (who has recently popped up in a dream of mine) asked today if The Thought Spot has no new posts, does it mean I'm not thinking... And it got me to thinking about the tornado of thoughts I've been living with for the last several months without any real outlet and how rusty my brain hinges have probably become by now. This is unacceptable, my faithful audience of at least one confirmed reader! I will now reveal all - prickly legs and bruised shins - the whole package!

If I remember when we last left off, I was struggling through an unsatisfying job as a salon receptionist. I was engaged in a catty, prolonged battle with the so-called salon manager with horrible linguistic skills, and I am proud to declare that I ultimately won. I drove her completely mad with my physical near-perfection and sharp wit and made her quit without notice or any hope for referrals after her 6 years of slave-like servitude. Even though this satisfied my ego for about two weeks, this ended up being a disaster for me personally. I naturally became the new manager, and immediately realized that I don't ever want to manage anything, especially a hair salon owned by an old, half-senile, self-deluded Jew who thinks himself the local Vidal Sassoon. My cushy schedule of about 30 hours per week turned into an arduous 50+ hours without any overtime pay. If I was at least paid overtime, then the decrease in sex-like activity would have been just a bit more bearable. As things were going during those hellish summer months, however, I was becoming suicidal. My sister working by my side during her summer break helped a little, but not much. Let me just conclude this sad little chapter by saying that by the time I gave my two weeks notice in September, I knew exactly what had made the former salon manager so peevish and short-tempered. I can't account for her inability to pronounce or spell simple words, but I know that her anger and anxiety stemmed from the truly evil atmosphere that permeated that whole place. The stylists were like rabid dogs, the clients like deformed trolls and goblins out of a Clive Barker novel, and the delusional owner who spent his days oiling his unsightly, amateurish sculptures was pointedly oblivious to the demoralizing state of things.

Quitting the salon opened up my schedule to dedicate all my free time to school work. Even though we met for class only two nights a week, I must have spent almost every waking second in the studio suites working on my video and audio editing projects, writing and recording commercials, skits, jingles, etc. That was probably the most satisfying period of time - no stupid job to get in the way of creativity - but it was also the most financially trying. My husband's salary kept us alive and well enough fed, but I can assure you, no exciting new purses or boots were added to my collection of redundant luxuries, and this fact still pains me. At any rate, I did what I had to - made good projects, made connections, forged bonds with my classmates - and I suppose it ultimately paid off. Now the semester is over, and I am second in my class GPA-wise, but I received more awards than any of my classmates for various achievements, and I was voted "The Rising Star of The Class" by all my teachers - a unique award in its own category. Am I bragging? Yes, yes I am. It's nice when people see the plain truth without being told to see it. I may not have the most distinctive speaking voice, and I may not be a good song announcer, but I've got the most unique brain inside this new blonde head of mine, and through my big blue eyes (and my sharp, slightly inappropriate one-liners) others were able to see through my cranium to view this splendid brain in action. Of course the next step is to apply my star-like qualities towards the acquisition of a job in the field, which I am just about ready to start doing. This is the first week that I can actually spend some time at home, and I'm taking full advantage of this rare opportunity to vedge. I have to admit, though, as much as my body is enjoying the relaxation, my aforementioned brilliant brain is restless, anxious for the next exciting thing to happen.

In other news, in my attempts to become familiar with the world of showbusiness, I've gotten myself some spiffy headshots and gone on a couple of auditions, just to experience the sort of interaction that takes place at these things. The only problem is that DC is probably the last place in the world you would want to be if you're trying to act, model, or entertain in any other way - unless of course you're a stripper or a naked model, in which case you're always in need. It's really quite insulting to have to convince the hacky locals of your talents as you read their ridiculous college thesis script with the full awareness that their movie will never ever become anything worthwhile. Another great example was when I went to audition for what was advertised as a part for a car commercial, but ended up being a solicitation for a "spokesperson" for a dealership in some ungodly part of rural Maryland where the lucky candidate's job would be to attend special sales events and greet customers while acting dumb and pretty. There was a vague possibility of a commercial to be shot, but the panel of obese, horribly dressed "judges" (the owners and managers of the dealership) didn't seem to care much about that or about the acting skills of all those auditioning. The question they kept raising was "What does PERSONALITY mean to YOU?! Because we need someone with PERSONALITY!!! " In an attempt to showcase my personality I rolled my eyes a lot and told one of the dealership owners he looks and sounds like Dr. Phil, but I guess that wasn't what the rednecks had in mind. Two days after the hilarious ordeal I, along with the other rejected girls - received an email with a sad face in the subject line informing us that some other lucky girl got the much-coveted part of balloon distributor for this fine auto import retailer. Wow. A sad face in the subject line. These people are clearly seasoned professionals.

Less embarrassingly, I am in the talks with an old acquaintance who now works for a development company about a photo commission for the lobby of a big new office building. I don't want to say any more, lest it falls through and I feel stupid, but this is a guy that has always liked me work and is a true art enthusiast, so I know he'll do what he can to make it happen.

On the personal front things are quiet. My old friend Ruth disappeared during her last visit to the area. She had me pick her up from the bus station, and then just never called me again, even after my repeated attempts to get in touch with her. I can only conclude that ultimately my company wasn't as enjoyable for her as the company of her other friends who unconditionally worship her every word, regardless of its irrationality or stupidity, and I can only wish her the best. I had great hopes for her - her spunky quirkiness used to be so refreshing - but then I realized her youth and immaturity and the sheer desire to be outrageous were the driving factors behind everything she said and did. Her thought process was starting to make less and less sense to me. When asked to articulate how she arrived at a certain idea, she would get frustrated and pick a fight. It would have been no problem for me - I like controversy and enjoy stirring it up among my family and friends - but I suppose for her the blind support of an admirer was more important than the scrutiny of an honest friend. So be it. From her myriad of new MySpace and Facebook photos, she's having the drunken time of her life in Brooklyn.

An old high school friend of mine moved into the neighborhood. I look forward to having someone close-by to hang out with.

And I really miss my dear old Erin. She's busy with school too, so at least I don't have to seethe with jealousy that someone else is taking up her time instead of me. But still. It would be nice to get together for some stiff drinks and cynical commentary on the world at large.

As for my marriage, it's rolling along. I suppose we are now reaching the first real speedbumps in what has so far been a fairy-tale romance. My being so busy lately has majorly cut into our intimacy. Leaving the house at the crack of dawn and getting back near midnight almost every day was so exhausting that it never even occurred to me to have a sexual thought. It's sad, too, because when I look at Thanasi purely objectively, when he's getting dressed for work or doing the dishes or something, I feel truly moved by his beauty and feel very stirred. It just always seems to happen when we don't actually have the time to act on these impulses. We need a tropical vacation, big time! Maybe we can get away for a quick Miami frolic during winter break. That would be wonderful.


p.s. Last week I began my orthodontic treatment. I now wear a bite fixer (retainer-like thing) which makes me sound like a mildly retarded person with a lisp. I am also trying desperately to find a way to fund the making of my new nose - apparently $5,000 doesn't just fall out of the sky exactly when you need it, god dammit! I would take out a loan, but with my student loan and the monthly payments I have to make for my teeth, that doesn't seem like an option right now. So if any benefactor wants to bestow some money on me without the expectation of sexual favors, that would be super.

pathetic

You know, it doesn't matter how old I get and how much I evolve - getting stood up by so-called "friends" never seems to hurt any less. This weekend brought a new level of disappointment when an old friend my husband and I haven't seen in a really long time didn't call or show up after the last thing that we said to one another earlier that day was "Okay, I'm driving up there now. I'm going to pick up my girlfriend , and we'll meet up as soon as I do."

Another similar instance involved my so-called "best" friend who is back home from NY for a week, and who called me before any of her other friends to tell me she's coming into town because she needed a ride from the bus station, but then ignored my calls for the entire weekend while partying with these "other" friends. What am I, some sort of social cripple? I like parties. I like meeting new people, but she purposely makes excuses to not invite me and to avoid me when she hangs out with these people.

Whatever. It's just embarrassing to find myself in such a vulnerable, needy state. I shouldn't care. All I do when I am around people is innumerate their flaws in my mind and smirk with satisfaction. I guess it just eats me that I've been deprived of the opportunity to do it this weekend. It would have been nice to see our dear old friend interact with his white trash girlfriend who is really just messing with his head. Likewise, it would have been great to see my ditsy "BFF" vie for the attention and approval of her other friends. The times I have seen her outside of the private clique consisting of her and me, she behaved herself in a much more reserved, rather dull fashion. With me she is boisterous, witty and scathingly funny. I guess her maddening need for acceptance drives her into the midsts of these mediocre groups of adolescents where she isn't pressured to think and express herself. I guess being friends with someone like me is exhausting. Because I hate so much about myself, I hate it all even more in others. Actually, I just really hate others in general, so maybe it's all for the better that we got stood up anyway. Instead of going out and wasting money, my husband and I bonded and frolicked by ourselves. We went to brunch, we did mundane house things, and we indulged in carnal activities. We played with our cats, we watched a great Parker Posie film ("The House of Yes"), and laughed and laughed and laughed. I guess this is growing up and having a life. Why else did I get married? When you find truly great company, someone who makes you feel at ease no matter what else is happening, you begin to realize that losing other people only hurts your pride and ego, not really you.

Or so I keep telling myself.

dreams

I had a dream last night that Muslim terrorists attacked a cruise ship on which I was celebrating some fancy occasion with a lot of random people I have known in life. I was also with little children, which I don't believe were mine, but were under my care. In any case, they rushed in on the celebration and surrounded everyone and loudly pronounced that in just a few moments everyone would go to Allah. One of the terrorists, with a pirate-like head wrap, rather than a turban, ran toward me and grabbed my arm, yelling some angry unintelligible nonsense at me, but I tried to talk to him and explain to him that because I am not an American, I should be spared. I begged with him to spare me and the children and I guess it worked, because next thing I remembered, I was in a hotel-like room. There was noise and chaos outside the doors, and I kept the lights off, not to give our presence away. I was laying down on the floor, urging the children to do the same. I was worried that I didn't know where my husband was. Both of my cats were there too, and they were running around the room as if nothing was wrong. Then suddenly he came - the terrorist that spared my life. He was angry, but seemed tired from all the slaughter and marauding he was just engaged in. Without hesitation, I stabbed him in the neck with a blue Bic pen multiple times, but he just wouldn't die. He would stagger about, bleeding a shockingly small amount of blood from the multiple wounds I inflicted on him. I stabbed him several more times in the neck, and then in the chest and back, and I think finally it worked. He collapsed. I was frustrated - I felt myself exerting the force necessary to slay him, I felt the resistance of his muscles to the relatively dull pen. I don't remember what happened next because I soon woke up. I was in a cold sweat. It was disturbing in a way I can't quite put a word to. My determination to kill this man was frighteningly intense.

Surely I am going insane.

Chapter 1

I can hardly believe it - here I am in my brand new, old house, with my young, older husband, with my new but tired old job, writing the same old nonsense in a brand new blog. This house looks so different from how it used to be when my parents lived here - it's actually pretty and clean, but it's still small and awkward, and practically reeks of poverty. Only poor people's houses have closets built in as incongruous afterthoughts, and have brassy yellow doorknobs on all the cardboard doors. I know they are cardboard because I accidentally kicked a hole through the upstairs bathroom door while trying to break in to extract my then hysterical husband. He isn't usually hysterical, so that day was especially scary, giving me superhuman powers which allowed me to kick that hole in the door. It's just about patched now, but it's still impressive and big - the size of a small watermelon.
I wish I could kick a hole the size of a watermelon through my so-called "manager's" thick head - a young woman who refers to sneaky underhanded people as "vouchers" (see:vultures), has been told by many that she is "condensed" (see:condescending) - what a bright girl - and writes me and my other co-workers barely intelligible notes about our shortcomings as her employees and reads them out loud to us, and sets up meetings on days off where she asks us questions like "where do you see yourself in five years?" and "how can you apply what we do at this job toward those goals and dreams?". We work at a hair salon, by the way, as receptionists, and unless I plan on entering a lot of old ladies' names into a computerized appointment book - names like Cookie, Bea, Dotty, Bev, Loretta, and Rochelle - I can't for the life of me fathom how this stupid job can ever help me on my quest to rule the world with my sagely wisdom and stunning good looks. I do meet a lot of people - some of them rich, some of them just plain crazy but pretending to be rich - and as soon as I can exploit this boundless source of networking contacts, I will do so with all my might. Maybe not. They're all mostly ancient anyway - that's the trouble with working at a salon that's been around for so long and is so damn reputable. All the damn people who started going there in the last millennium still go, though their husbands are dead, and they shuffle in with their walkers and oxygen tanks, and complain of colon prolapses. I feel sad for them and humor them with kind words like "honey", "darling", and "dear", especially "dear". It's become an annoying habit of mine, to call people "dear", but in certain contexts it works.

Fuck this job anyway. I am counting the days until school starts. I never thought I would ever think that, or say that out loud, or write it out loud in a public forum that no one yet reads... Either way I am consumed with the drive to get on TV or the radio, which is why I successfully applied to broadcasting school. I had to audition and everything, which a hammy person like me just lives for. By hammy I don't mean porky, as in lardy, as in junky-trunked. I mean brilliant and perfect in every way, the kind of person a camera adores and an audience hates for being so flawless. And by flawless I mean with crooked teeth, random chin hairs, and a noticeably Semitic nose which awkwardly sits on a slim, elegant face with big, animated blue eyes with lush eyelashes and pouty lips. Strangely enough, it works, but my appearance has nonetheless given me a plethora of insecurities and neuroses. What better way to overcome them than by parading myself for the world to see, all the while spewing brain-stew of a similar nature.

This is just my warm-up. I've been thinking a lot, thinking too much, mentally articulating my philosophies on life. My ideas are great, but they are for a world not so far gone. But they still exist, and I intend to record them. Maybe one day someone will dig up my writings and pore over them like we do over ancient texts today. Oh how I pity that fool.