wine and cheap perfume

Last Thursday was my first day training to teach at the school in Queens. I showed up knowing nothing about the school or what they intended to do with me, aside from some vague instruction to "teach writing."
When I went to get dressed in the morning, I realized that I didn't know if the school had a dress code. I knew that if I wore a dress I'd probably get beat up or knocked up cause the neighborhood is mildly shady (all I have are slutty bartender dresses and, like, a prom dress) and I didn't want to wear jeans, so I packed my ass into my only clean, un-wrinkled pair of pants: buck-tight black corduroys so tight I can't breathe or walk in them. Details. At least they weren't jeans. So I stuffed myself into them with, like, a shoehorn, put on a weird little sweater that seemed teacherly to me, and hobbled out the door. When I arrived, I met the dean, who, after looking me up and down in horror, casually suggested that I not wear clothing "quite as tight" because the kids are highly hormonal and would be staring at me for extensive periods of time. Then she brought me to an English class to observe. The kids were having a heated discussion about whether or not it was okay to make fun of disabled people.
"It is not nice to make fun of people who is disabled because what if that was your mother," argued a girl in a pale pink J-Lo sweatshirt and large gold hoops.
"Yeah," agreed a skinny Indian boy sitting to her left. "Or your sister or brother!"
"I don't care," countered an enormous Webster-lookalike (facially, of course) who appeared to be about 36 years old. "It's funny! If that was my mother or my brother, then I'd make fun of them too!" He batted a plump, limp-wristed hand against his chest, made that typical retard sound and then crossed his arms, satisfied with his act of idiotic defiance.
"Daniel, you just tryin' to say the opposite of what everyone else say because you want attention!" accused Sasha, a tiny Dominican girl in an over-sized red parka who sat in the back of the room.
"Shut up Sasha!" he retorted, angrily jutting out his lower jaw.
"YOU shut up," Sasha answered, and then the teacher intervened.
"That's enough," she mumbled wearily.
I looked around the room and listed to the way they spoke to each other, I remembered how awful 9th grade is. It is so awkward and cruel and honest; like the real world, only void of social grace and independence.
Afterwards I was introduced to another class, one for which I am designing a curriculum. "Get to know them!" prompted the dean, as she hurried out the door, leaving me in the classroom to fend for myself. I spoke with them individually about their interests and hobbies, to get a sense of what sort of assignments would interest them. One boy told me that his dream was to save up enough money to buy a Honda Civic. Another girl told me that she liked listening to Filipino R&B, because it's "more truthful than American R&B when it talks about love"; a sullen boy with a bunch of blingy chains told me that he preferred Denver to Queens because the people there were "more friendly." Then an impish kid drowing in a floor-length hoodie gave me a Dorito, and I bonded with the class snob about our affinity for nice sneakers.
As I spoke with each kid, I was reminded for the first time in a long time of how interesting and vast this world is. So what if I'm being played by a dog groomer? So what if my dye job makes me look like a back-alley hooker? So what if my gynecologist is evasive and and I live with my cousin and dog in an apartment the size of a utility closet? There are so many fascinating things happening around us all the time. It's silly how caught up we become in our vapid little bubbles. Mine burst last Thursday, and it was much appreciated.
P.S. I noticed that whenever I turned around, or walked away, I would hear kids laughing throughout the day. It wasn't until I was on my way out of the building that I realized why: an ENORMOUS piece of gum was clinging to the center of my ass. I am not being hyperbolic when I say "ENORMOUS." Like, envision a package of that shredded Big League gum. That, chewed. Three cheers for stellar first impressions!

So, we've all thought about the pros and cons of having kids, right?
Pros: you'll be less self-involved, feel love in an overwhelming capacity, and guarantee that someone will take care of you (emotionally, physically, monetarily) when you're old, weak, and broke.
Cons: you'll get fat, have a baggy vadge, no time for yourself, and run the risk of birthing a child who is deformed or retarded. But how about if you make a baby that just, like, sucks?
Tonight I had dinner with my parents, their friend, and their friend's annoying 23-year old daughter. As we sat around their ornate wooden coffee table, slugging wine and stuffing pitless olives into our mouths to fill the awkward breaks in conversation, I watched the daughter, dumbfounded. Perfectly amiable and relentlessly smiley, she said nothing unpleasant or even remotely rude. She just took my breath away, time and time again: making dorky jokes about people in her office, jovially teasing her morose, pear-shaped boyfriend about his love for Bay Ridge, singing Channukah songs with a little too much gusto, and lavishly praising her mother's mediocre brisket.
"Mom, you've REALLY outdone yourself this time," she chomped, bits of latke and meat flying from her lips.
She wore a polka-dotted blouse, neatly-pressed slacks, and low-heeled, sensible pumps, all of which made for an aesthetic not unlike that of a 40-something paralegal from Rockland County circa 1998.
I studied her curiously all night, the same thing running through my head over and over and over: what the hell would I do if this was my daughter? I couldn't send her to a special school, because she's not unintelligent, and a finishing school wouldn't do her any good because her table manners were adequate. I couldn't send her to regular school OR boarding school because she'd get beat up, but if I home schooled her, I'd have to have her around all the time. If I put her up for adoption I'd never forgive myself, and my parents definitely wouldn't take her in. What the hell would I do with her if she was mine? Unable to arrive at a conclusion, I lit the fourth candle on the menorah, ate some nut-encrusted cookies, and raced out the door, overwhelmed and totally stressed out. I still don't have the answer, and would have bought an economy-sized box of condoms to ensure that I'm not faced with such a problem if I a.) decided to actually commit to bi-sexuality, b.) ever had sex with anyone whatsoever, or c.) was in a serious relationship that I could foresee begging the question: kids?
Seeing as how neither a.), b.), nor c.) will happen anytime in the near future, I instead went to Starbucks and ordered hot chocolate, which was luke-warm and watery. That's what I get for being so judgmental, I guess.

There's nothing more annoying than someone who bombards you with stories about all of the wild and crazy things they do when they're drunk. The difference here is that I don't see this as an opportunity to go on a bragging spree that poses as self-deprecation. I see this as an opportunity for introspection. Last night Melissa and I went to Southpaw, where Sarah Michaels throws this party called "Laid." Obviously I didn't get laid, because I never have sex, like, ever, but I did do so many embarrassing things I think I need to lay off both alcohol and human interaction for a while.
We got out of the cab and found Ellie, Lucky, and that girl that everyone thinks is hot (don't know her name, she raps and models for DITC) smoking outside. Lucky and I went and drank so much tequila it's nauseating, I lost my phone, and a girl tried to convince me to go to the Michegan Womyn's Music Festival (the name alone serves as a deterrent). Her main selling point was that last year when she was there, she got "gang banged by a group of hot butches." (No interest in getting gang banged-is that weird?). She continued, "people still come up to me and say, 'Oh my God, I saw a girl pull her fist out of you in the woods in Michegan and it was the hottest thing I've ever seen in my life!'"
I said, "Wow."
Then I was dancing with this girl from Philly who told me that her tits were "perky as hell," and then I was in the basement getting yelled at by a bathroom attendant for falling asleep on a couch by the sinks, and then--I don't remember.
Melissa tells me that I unknowingly traipsed around with a hanger clinging to the back of my head for a while. A woman had pushed a rack of t-shirts by me and one of the hangers got tangled and stuck in my hair. I vaguely remember the cab ride back into the city, and I woke up this morning in all my clothes, feeling sick as a dog and my skin a light shade of green. I took Vitamin C, took off my clothes, ate a brownie, and went back to sleep for four more hours. Not cute. I'm a grown-up. I need to stop doing this. Like, this isn't fun anymore. When I finally dragged myself out of bed I headed back into Brooklyn to pick up my phone, came back, hung out with Annie for a little while, and am now trying to figure out how the hell I'm supposed to finish this article that I've been writing about lesbians and sneakers that is kind of funny but totally aimless. Note to self: stop writing about lesbians. It's getting old.

My ex-girlfriend has the peculiar habit of speaking like a straight-up street thug when she's drunk. Last night she called me completely wasted. "Are you drunk?" I asked.
"Yea. I'm DRUNK." she replied.
I was concerned. "How are you?" Supposedly, she had sworn off alcohol.
"Aiiiight," she slurred.
"How was Lacey?" I asked. Lacey is a friend of hers from Oakland who had recently come to visit.
"She CRAZY."
I paused. It had been a long, long time since I had spoken to Annie when she was that drunk, and I had forgotten about the weird speech affectations that, for her, go hand-hand with excessive alcohol consumption.
"'She crazy?'" I asked. "Why? You love Lacey."
"Nah, son. She still sprung on ANDREW and she acting all CRAZY."
The notion of a person with a name like "Andrew" being used in conjuction with such language is incredible. It's like someone saying, "Eugene ain't RIGHT. He sprung on Gladys, but shorty is WACK."

One of my professors just told me that my writing "witty, hard-edged, and urban." To hear this from an accomplished author is so exciting there aren't words. It could have been because her evaluation form is due next week and she wanted a flattering write-up, but still. Ever since I started grad school I've been wracked with insecurities about my writing. To be around so many other people aspiring to do exactly what I do is intimidating, especially because many of them do it better. Well, not better, per se. But smarter. My writing tends to be very energized but superficial, and I think it is because I have a pathological fear of delving deeper and discovering nothing but a gaping hole of mediocrity. So I can write about ex-cons and facial peels and all the odd little things that I encounter in my silly little life and have a good enough time doing it that I don't feel the need for introspection. Which is cowardly and lame. It's time to take the bull by the horns, whatever the hell that means.

You are in gym class. You are ten years old. You are a fiercely competitive, highly skilled dodgeball player. You play as if your life depended on it, three times a week, for twenty minute intervals. You do so in ill-fitting navy blue gym shorts with your school’s acronym, “U.N.I.S.", stamped across your right thigh.
Next month it will be badminton. The P.E. teacher, Deborah, likes to mix things up. The game has just come to a close. Your team won. Now it’s time to stretch. You are quite flexible; you bend down and press your palms on the gym floor. You lunge to the left; then to the right. You sit down. It’s time to touch your toes in this position. Laura, the classmate sitting to your left, is Swedish. She hasn’t lived in New York for long and her English is poor. She is the class outcast. Not because she is Swedish (after all, you attend an international school), but because she doesn’t listen to Technotronic or Paula Abdul, wears barrettes with farm animals on them, and has a habit of trying to speak colloquially and failing.
“Oh my GODS!” she shrieks.
You continue stretching. You don’t realize that her comment was directed at you.
“What is WRONG of your KNEE?” she squeals.
You turn your sweaty head towards her to see what she’s squealing about. You see her index finger pointing towards your leg. You look down.
“Oh my GOD!” you shout. You have never seen anything like it. One of your knees is knobby, beige, and about the size of a tangerine. The other is swollen, red, and about the size of an NCAA basketball.
“What is WRONG with my KNEE?” You shout.
“That is the WAY gross!” she exclaims.
You glare at her. “Shut up. You don’t even speak English."
A small crowd has clustered around you. They are silent, eyes wide, drinking in the monstrosity that is your knee. Truck-shaped Deborah jogs over, flat-top smooth and still, whistle flapping against her large, low-slung breasts.
“Alright, alright. Settle down. What’s going on here?”
“Look at this KNEE!” squeaks the Swede.
Deborah leans in, concerned. You bury your face in your hands. You feel like a leper. You want to disappear. You hear people laughing.
“Baby, do you feel okay? Does your knee hurt?” Deborah is worried.
“Yes. No. I mean, I’m okay,” you whisper.
“Baby, let’s get you to the nurse’s office. Your knee needs to be checked out. Can you walk on it?”
For some reason, this question infuriates you. “Yes I can WALK on it!” you answer. “I just played DODGEBALL for TWENTY MINUTES!” You are trying not to cry. You are embarrassed.
“Hey now. Don’t raise your voice. Come with me.” You stand up and pull a poly-cotton wedgie out of your butt. You watch people watch you walk, as if you’ve suddenly morphed into an alien. You walk just fine, thank you. Laura is angry. She knows she has already re-assumed her position of class outcast. Your swollen knee in no way rivals the social crime that is her goat-shaped hair-clip, or her shameful misuse of early 90’s sayings like “Cowabunga, dude.”
Your classmates quickly lose interest. There is no dramatic spectacle. No laborious baby steps, no theatrical wincing. You watch them file into the locker room, not understanding why this has happened to you.