Cold Snap

How forgetful we are of cold and of hurt.

I can't remember winter. Funny, considering I've experienced over two dozen of them. Yet I'll be damned if I can carry an accurate impression of the season from year to year. Superficial memories abound. Snow, cocoa, wet chilly wool? Those, I keep. Darkness, despair and marrow-deep cold? They begin to fade with the sun of each lengthening day. By the time the first crocus wriggles up, they're gone. Disintegrated and blown away across newly-verdant fields. For the next seven or eight months, the word will evoke naught but eggnog and evergreens. Winter has once again been Sanitized For My Protection.

It's like childbirth. Nature, cruel and clever, knows to slip you an amnesiac. Why else would you do such a thing again? You can never recall why things were so blackly, bleakly challenging. The past is erased, as it your ability to stave off a repeat... to run screaming for your diaphragm or one-way tickets to Ft. Lauderdale.

You forget. You can't dredge up the bottom-dwelling dreck from the hidey-hole of last year. And, as such, can't take a prophylactic leap off a short pier when autumn begins to eke out its last.

If winter's a knife in the side, Daylight Savings Time is the twist. Changes nature sensibly chose to distribute over a month or more are condensed into a single evening. It's a mutation of the nasty, horror-movie kind.

Until that fateful weekend, the season's a slow-moving beast, scaled belly scraping the earth, masticating another a few minutes of sunlight each day. Then the game changes. The clocks roll back, and sixty minutes - sixty of them! All at once! - are devoured. Snap, chomp, gone. That innocuous little lizard turns out to be more akin to Godzilla... rending the fabric of the day between mighty animatronic jaws, knocking the earth off its orbit with a flick of his tail.

The first Monday is hard. Not the hardest - that, you fear, is still to come - but compounded by shock.

I strolled outside, post-work, and it was... dark. "Dark" is a relative term in the city, of course. In the forest, the night is black, proper black, splotched with silver-white puddles of moonlight. Urban nights, for all their thrills, lack such stark beauty. It gets dimmer and muddier. The usual post-workday scramble is suffused with fatigue. People rest their heads against bus windows, eyes closed, utterly spent at 6 PM. They weren't so easily depleted a week ago. Yet again, it wasn't winter.

Exiting the bus and wandering home, my emotions were as dim as my surroundings. "Oh, yeaaah," I thought, "This happened last year, too. For a loooong time. How the hell are we going to get through this without killing ourselves?"

"This winter can't be as bad as last one, can it?" I asked Kateri, grasping for reassurance. "Can it? I mean, if I recall, it was… bad. Really bad.”"

“Yeah, it was bad,” she said, "But things were different then."

Truer words never spoken.

We’d each gotten our first taste of post-marriage life that summer. There’s no finer season to be newly single. The air’s heavy with lust and potential. Clothes, cares and inhibitions are readily shed. Even single parenting seems like a lark… long walks! Ice cream for dinner! Playdates in the park!

We were understandably enraptured with our independence. We had the world at our fingertips, babies on our hips, bite marks on our necks. “Aren’t our new lives awesome?” we’d comment, giggling while we sipped red wine and let our bediapered posse rip up the local café.

Flash forward a few months. It’s cold. It’s dark. And it’s bad. Really bad. Neither of us saw it coming.

“We had each other,” Kateri said, “But we didn’t have what we really needed.”

We didn’t have what we needed... or what we wanted. We didn’t know the difference between the two. And we didn’t know how to obtain either one.

We huddled inside, occasionally ducking out for a gallon of milk or a bad date. While the glacial weather was chapping our hands and faces, our nerves were being abraded by a series of spectacularly unsuitable men. Annoying, aloof, disrespectful, disreputable… they ran the gamut. And yet we couldn’t get enough. The slightest signs of affection were pounced on as though they were deep-fried Twinkies and we were starving… which we were. A few days of silence from our pseudo-paramours was enough to make us hungry, cranky, desperate.

“Heard from Mr. X?”
“Not since last Tuesday. Heard from Mr. Y?”
“Radio silence.”
“Fuck.”
“Fuck.”

From my current vantage point, I have no way of remembering the dismal drudgery of The Winter of Our Discontent. It’s been suppressed, like late-stage contractions or junior high in its entirety. I can imagine, though. Trudging through the snow, juggling diaper bags, groceries and a baby who wasn’t yet walking. Scattering my fire on the wind, blowing sparks towards a series of straw men, hoping one would ignite... and then being perplexed as to why my hands were burnt and my back was freezing.

Climate change be damned... that winter didn’t last forever. Things began to slowly shift with the first thaw. The warmth and light helped, of course. Finding a suitable bedmate seems a bit less dire when the comforters have been put away. Most important, though, was the fact that we’d survived. We hadn’t starved, frozen or slaughtered ourselves with ice scrapers. We’d spent a season alone. We weren’t just alive - we were better for it. The testosterone brigade’s text messages and lame excuses hadn’t sustained us through those bleak days. We’d done it ourselves. We’d kept relatively sane, performed home repairs, entertained the children during blizzards, prepared vast mountains of mac ‘n cheese, learned the measure of our own worth.

Our second summer of liberation brought further drinks, hijinks and late-night chicanery. It also brought, as I marveled, “... something I never saw coming! Well, um, except for in the dirty sense.”

Boyfriends.

We’d spent the summer in scorched-earth dating mode. This go-round, we suffered no fools. When our cell phones rang, we didn’t dive for them... we let them ring. Our bodies were sheathed in wispy, low-cut little numbers, but our hearts were armor-clad. “My date was late tonight,” I told Kateri, “And you know what? I realized I would’ve been legitimately happy if he just didn’t show up.”

We were badasses of love, refusing to concede an inch, guarding our emotions with heavy artillery “until things are absolutely, totally right”.

Imagine how surprised we were when they actually were.

Flowers started appearing on our mantels. Phone calls were not only returned, they were initiated. We were treated with respect, loved with gusto, mind and body.

“I might’ve just had an epiphany,” I whispered into Kateri’s ear, twirling a drink stirrer between my fingers. We were sitting in a booth at our dive bar of choice. The leaves and ambient temperature had recently dropped. Warmth was trickling from the earth, but we were, for the moment, still full of hope. And alcohol.

“... yet again, I might just be drunk.”

“Tell me! Tell me!” she said.

“So I was listening to ‘Pressure Drop’. It’s one of my favorite songs, ever, of all time. Love it! And it suddenly occurred to me that this might... possibly... maybe - fuck, this is scary -… be... the one for me.”

“Really?”

“I mean, I’ve had three Scotch and sodas. But, yeah. I’d be happy with that. Really fucking happy. And not for the wrong reasons. Not this time.”

Not this time. It’s nearly December. Winter’s nasty little fangs are about to clamp down on our asses (which, I might add, are decidedly smaller than last year). I fear the cold and the dark, the cabin fever and isolation. But this year won’t be as bad as last. It can’t. The boyfriends play a part - new love warms the room up more than a flotilla of woodstoves. But it’s mainly us. Desperation is a piss-poor fuel, one we won’t be using again. Our days of scattering embers are over. We built a giant bonfire, with our own hands. We stripped down to our undies and danced around, reveling in our handiwork. We chased away those who might steal our heat.

We’ll be hunkering down against the cold with companions who were drawn to us at our strongest... women who take no shit, take no prisoners. Women who make fire.

This year may be one we actually remember.

Things I DO Believe In, Pt. II - Controlled Substances, Child-Rearing, Splenda & Audience Participation

1. All recreational drugs - and by "all", I mean ALL - should be legalized. Someone very close to me once battled a nasty smack habit. It was heartbreaking, horrifying and something I wouldn't wish on any person - or their family. And y'know what? It only strengthened my belief in legalization. While arguments for criminalization are abundant, I have yet to find one which holds water.

"But what if heroin were cheap and everywhere?"

Heroin IS cheap, and it IS everywhere. Given half an hour and the cash I have in my pocket, I could easily score a bag.

"But then EVERYONE would do it!" Would you do it? Would your child do it? Fear of a governmental ass-whupping is among the weakest of motivations for one's acts. A sense of personal ethics is just that - personal. It cannot be codified or handed down from on high.

"But society would collapse!" In 2005, the federal government spent $12 billion fighting the "War on Drugs", as well as an additional $30 billion incarcerating those convicted of drug-related offenses. $42 billion seems like a ludicrously generous chunk of change to help ease the social changes that legalization would bring.

I could debate this endlessly.

2. When discussing the delightful differences in male and female anatomy with young children, proper anatomical terms should be used. For the love of Flynt, it's a penis. Not a "pee-pee", not a "wee-wee", not - as one ex-boyfriend's mother disturbingly deemed it - a "tallywhacker". It's a penis.

Ed. Note: From That Point Forward, I Resolved to Both Shave AND Don Pants More Often

Jul, emerging from the shower: "Hi, J.Q.! Did you have fun coloring while mommy washed up?"
J.Q., staring in fascination at Jul's groin: "Mommy have... BUGS on it?"
Jul: [stunned silence] ... "Um, no... no, baby. Not bugs."
J.Q., venturing another guess: "Mommy have SPRINKLES on it?"
Jul: "I wish, baby. It's hair."
J.Q.: "MOMMY HAVE HAIR ON IT!"
Jul: "You're going to say that on the bus, aren't you?"

3. Even if you're not PLANNING on doing so - even if you're going to be carried around on a plush dais, being massaged with fragrant oils and fed slivers of medium-rare lamb - your shoes should be conducive to running.

This isn't to say that you should pair fugly, mud-splattered cross trainers with a Prada dress. However, you can always choose a nice pair of maryjanes over, say, those towering Balenciaga monstrosities which could also be used to lobotomize unwanted suitors.

4. Extrasensory perception... but not the type which can supposedly be controlled, manipulated and used to win big bucks via scratch-off tickets. I believe that humans are interconnected in ways we can't really comprehend. Whether these ties are vestiges of an ancient time or a tiny hint of evolutionary progress, I couldn't say. But existence nonetheless seems to be a colloid - an invisible, ever-shifting web of linkages. When you experience a tiny, inadvertent spasm, your hand flails out and you happen to brush against another spot on the web... that's ESP.

5. Assuming all other factors are equal, engaging in a higher percentage of non-consumption, non-production activities will lead to a proportionately higher level of happiness.

6. Babies under a year old should be carried as often as one's spinal column and constitution can tolerate. Nasty old ladies who sneer, "That child is NEVER going to learn how to walk if you keep carrying him!" should be (bitch-slapped with their own Valu City bags, garroted with their own plastic rain bonnets, tersely informed, "And YOU'RE never going to get the vigorous dicking you clearly require and which might make you less of a shrill, dessicated old hag, you shrill, dessicated old hag!").

7. Artificial sweeteners' purported nasty side effects could not possibly be worse than the effects of eating an equivalent quantity of "real" sugar (a product so far removed from its natural source as to be semi-synthetic itself).

8. It is far preferable to be alone than to be in a relationship where you must persuade your partner to stay with you. Desperate coercion is odious enough - just look at the guy who sold you your Taurus. Selling yourself to someone who should (in an ideal situation) be your strongest advocate? It kicks your soul in the crotch. Then, while said spiritual entity is writhing around on the floor, moaning curses of positively corporeal vulgarity... it kicks it some more.

9. I don't want to know where I'll be in twenty years.. Knowing one's future seems dull, depressing and horribly confining - you can squirm out of a straightjacket more easily than a two-bedroom condo in Levittown. But I do have a very strong mental image of my future self.

I'm soaking wet, fully-clothed and knee-deep in a warm ocean. The tide is picking up; little waves splash my legs as the sun and the wind dry my face. The beach is a far cry from Club Med; it's covered in wild tangles of foliage and towering, moss-slicked rocks. The sun is sinking behind a jaggy black outcropping. I am calmer than I've ever been in my life.

I believe in this image. I'm waiting for it to happen like some people wait for their 401(K) contributions to mature. It's a smooth little stone I carry in my pocket. It busies my fingers when I worry. It comforts me with its weight.

So... what do YOU believe in?

Things I DO Believe In, Pt. I - Hygiene, Morality, Cars, Cutlery & More

[Inspired by Sistah Cupcake's "Things I Don't Believe In" series.

Please note that these are MY OWN PERSONAL beliefs; I did not pick them up bed-in-a-bag style at Target, nor do I feel they apply to anyone but me. If you wish to adopt any of them, go right ahead. They've served me well and are unlikely to take a whiz on the carpet of your existence.]

1. Tide. More importantly, I believe that my decision to begin purchasing Tide (rather than Wash-U-Cheep or Archer Farms Brand "Vaguely Mountainous" Scented Anionic Surfactant) was a triumph of self-love. No, not THAT kind of self-love. That would sting.

"It's two dollars less than Tide," I thought, taking a deep, DNA-mutating whiff before returning the jug of generi-tergent to the shelf. "But… but Tide makes everything smell all nice and Tide-y. All my clothes, my sheets, my towels… I'm going to be enveloped in this scent for the next month, easily. Isn't my olfactory satisfaction worth two bucks?"

I could hear my ancestors plotzing from beyond the grave. I didn't care. I tossed my Tide in the cart and never looked back.

2. Using baby wipes in lieu of T.P. If you stepped in poop, you'd probably want something a bit more robust than a paper towel to clean up the mess, no? Why should your nether aperture be held to a lower standard of cleanliness? And don't try telling me that "it doesn't get THAT dirty down there, Jul!" You're not a goddamned gazelle, capable of popping out dainty, self-contained pellets while gallivanting on the savanna. If you've ever SEEN a FunYun - let alone allowed one to enter your digestive system- you need baby wipes.

3. Tongue cleaning. Bend a credit card so that the short sides have the approximate curvature of a Pringle. Hold it at a 45-degree angle to your tongue. Then... uh... well... lick. Hard. It's not a brute-force scraping so much as an impassioned oral tango between you and your expired American Express. After a few hearty swipes, your tongue will be cleaner, your breath will be fresher and everything from coconut sorbet to French kissing to yodeling along with "Freebird" will be a little sweeter.

4. Each of my actions can be categorized as positive, negative or neutral. Each type of action affects the overall "charge" of the universe (albeit on a ridiculously infinitesimal level). Whenever possible, I need to make a conscientious effort not to release any particles of negativity into the current. Even the tiniest actions' impact should be considered. The tiniest actions are, in a way, the most important – if you're committed to living your life a certain way, you do so at all times… not just times of great significance or while others are watching.

If I drop a straw wrapper, I pick it up. Otherwise, I would be placing the burden of doing so on someone else. I'm far from perfect, and so I shall remain. I won't pick up everything I drop. But the day I stop trying – the day I stop examining my own deeds, stop evaluating what "good" means and how I can work towards it – is the day I cease being a person and start being a vacant shell.

5. Odd number are better (for no particular reason).

6. Manual transmissions are better (they make crappy less crappy and good cars more fun).

7. When consuming fast food, plastic utensils are better. Soft, bendy, pthalate-packed plastic is best.

8. I never want any of my opinions on hot-button social issues to be simple enough to sum up on a bumper sticker. "IF THIS CIVIC'S A-CREAKIN', DON'T COME A-PEEKIN'", however? Genius!

9. When I die, I will go back to the earth. The matter which comprised "Jul" will assume other forms. Death is not an ending... death is a bend in the Moebius strip of existence.

If my family can be said to possess a belief system, this is it. This is how we were raised. Whenever a pet died, it didn't "go to heaven"... it went back to the earth, nourished other life forms and began a new part of the cycle.

This was no less comforting (and a great deal more plausible) than the concept of heaven. Thanks, ma!

T.B.C. ...

All Pink Is Not Salmon

[Ed. Note: the title is a rather silly joke, as salmon are known for their - HAR! - spawning. Titles aren't my forte. The "book" I'm allegedly "working on" (est. publication date: February 2037, est. publisher: um... the fuel-cell printer in my hovercar?) draws its title from a Rage Against the Machine song. Zach de la Rocha = WAY worse than piscene humor.]

His hands are small, sticky and perpetually wriggling free from mine.

His ambitions are bigger than his britches. The latter are a petite 2T, the former a grandiose "dismantle entire Western hemisphere (and possibly insert into mouth)".

He's big enough to scale the obstacles, small enough to require abundant kisses when he falls off. The most constant refrain is also the most futile: "J.Q., stay near mommy."

Literally, figuratively... doesn't work for either one. Time and toddlers are both way more stubborn than me.

Time has seemed especially fleeting as of late. Months pass like bites of cotton candy... bursts of sweetness which dissolve almost instantly. He periodically refuses to sit on my lap, spurning my advances with a devilish grin and a squeaky, "No! Go away, mommy!"

One day, "periodically" will become "frequently". One day, "frequently" will become permanent. He will giggle, slide to the floor and never look back. It will happen before I know it. He's already two ("… an' a half!", as he reminds me).

It's thrilling and heartbreaking.

I want to snuggle him to my chest, bury my nose in his hair and never, ever unclench my grip.

I want him to explore the world, the solar system, to discover far-flung galaxies made entirely of molybdenum.

I want a million more Toddler Astronomy Lessons… lying next to a Sagan in dinosaur pajamas, being kicked by tiny warm feet and regaled with tales of how, "It nighttime… the moon comes! When sun comes, it gonna be… daytime! Evybody get up!"

I want his sense of joyous adventure to persist long after he's left the lap.

I want this to happen, even as it's killing me.

What I don't want? Is another baby.

---

For years – even prior to his birth – I'd envisioned J.Q. having siblings. My sisters and I are extremely close; our bond has been a frequent comfort (and occasional lifesaver). The concept of what I wanted for myself didn't even register on my consciousness. It was an equation even my math-challenged brain could comprehend… siblings were good, I wanted good things for my child, ergo, producing a few more chilluns would be desirable.

Then my marriage collapsed, my life changed and the math got a lot more complicated.

---

August 1st, 2006. Independence Day. I tossed a few lawn 'n leaf bags full of clothing into my Civic and hit the highway. Not quite "Easy Rider", but still the wildest trip I've ever taken. Literally overnight, I went from doing the majority of the childcare in a dull, far-flung suburb to sharing half-'n-half custody while living in the heart of a major (if slightly urine-dampened) metropolitan area.

I fell in instantaneous love with the city. It was surly, grimy, difficult and entirely mine. I loved my block. I loved my neighborhood. But I especially loved a tiny stretch of I-676, just north of Center City. It's a magical patch of macadam if ever there were one. You're tooling along, surrounded by nothing but asphalt, contemplating ordering a pizza for dinner… then you make a tight left, and you're suddenly ENVELOPED by Philadelphia. It swells around you on all sides, twinkly and bright and enormous. You are hurtling straight towards the center of a place where anything can happen.

Not to kill a perfectly lovely analogy, but my life didn't always feel like that little stretch of highway. Much of the time, it felt like certain areas of West Philly… circuitous, confusing and terrifying.

However, the feelings of excitement and potential never fully waned. Sometimes – as I fumbled through challenges and gained a modicum of self-confidence – they were massive. They sprawled across the entire skyline.

I wasn't at all sure of my course. But I could feel myself being gently propelled forward… away from an unexamined life which had never really felt like my own, toward something brand-new, uncertain and scary, but definitely, unequivocally mine. Each aspect was carefully considered, wiggled into place, lab-tested again and again. Certain things immediately "clicked"… running, brutal honesty, walking home from work and letting the baby throw things in each and every fountain we encountered.

Other things took time. Relationships, responsibility, managing to wash the dishes before the apartment turned into Fruit Fly Island.

Some things just never seemed right. When I thought about having more children – immediately, at some nebulous future point, ever – my reaction was always complex. I'd imagine holding a tiny newborn against my bare chest. I'd sigh and smile. I'd imagine the late nights, the tears, the milestones, the sacrifice. I'd tense. I'd imagine embarking upon full-time parenting once again. My personal time, drastically reduced. My ability to pursue my own interests, harshly curtailed. My chances to revel in unabashed selfishness? More or less annihilated.

And I'd go out of my mind with terror and claustrophobia.

---

I'm a good mom to J.Q. Rather, I try to be... I'm a bit distrustful of anyone who claims to be a "good parent"; like being a good person, it's a continuous process. The effort must be renewed each day. So I try. I let him know how much he's loved. I give him relatively free reign to explore, experiment and play. I celebrate his quirks. I nudge him towards some semblance of morality. I buy him eminently cool shoes.

Do I love the almighty hell out of my kid? Yes.

Do I love parenting him? Yes, I adore it.

Every single minute? No.

Do I love the idea of parenting in general, outside of my own somewhat-unique situation? No. Absolutely not.

At first, I worried that sharing custody would make me a worse mother... that my parenting acumen was directly tied to the number of hours logged with my kid.

If that sentiment were any further from the truth, it'd have to be included in J.Q.'s Enormous Honking Book of Fairy Tales.

I've been a half-time parent for a little over a year. I am much, much better at this than full-time parenting. I'm happier. J.Q. is happier. I can't imagine going back.

When I'm with J.Q., I'm with J.Q. I'm not distracted by housework, hobbies or other errata - I try my damndest to take care of those on non-custodial days. I'm not teetering on the brink of burnout - I'm never more than a few days removed from a break, complete with adult libations, extra sleep, and eerie silence. My interests and J.Q.'s interests don't often conflict... they each have their time to be fulfilled.

Sound like luxuries? They are. They were bought at the expense of time with my child. While I cherish my personal time, I also miss the hell out of my little boy. I wonder about how he's doing, what acts of cute devilry he's plotting. Sometimes, I feel guilty. Sometimes, deeply so.

Nonetheless, our current arrangement feels right. Not right for everyone, of course... but it works for us. Parenting, Version One never felt this comfortable and copacetic. I was permanently exhausted. My stress level rarely dipped below the "OH HOLY SHIT!!!" range. I had a hard time summoning up energy, enthusiasm or much sentiment beyond nose-to-the-grindstone determinism.

Things would be different today, of course. There would be a different spouse... different living situation... different experiences... different me.

It's the last item which makes the real difference, of course.

The spouse, the house, the atlas of scars to guide my path... they're largely irrelevant. I'm different. Siblings might be in J.Q.'s best interests. However, my interests now get a say. They're a frustrating bunch... inconsistent and often unintelligible. However, one sentiment almost always seems to rise above the din. It's one of my son's favorite's, too: "Noooooo!"

---

Why would I want anything less for myself than I want for my child?

I want to explore, to branch out, to try and do and touch and feel.

I want to retain that little spark. I want to burn down a brushfield with it, race away with a grin on my face and embers in my hair.

I want a gamut of feelings as broad as Lake Baikal and as deep as the Marianas Trench. I want memories of both locales… being a speck of static on a vast field of gray frost, bobbing languidly above something unimaginably deep.

I want these things for J.Q., which is why I want him to grow up. It kills me, it really does... he's three feet tall. He uses an assortment of pronouns. He can solve problems which would stump your average reality-TV participant.

The baby years are over, for both of us. Because I want these things for me... or at least the opportunity to pursue them. Further years of child-rearing would put me further away from my goals and aspirations. Of course I'd love any hypothetical future kids... but that's not even close to sufficient reason to have them. I'd take a bullet for J.Q., but I'm not going to encourage the universe to start taking potshots.

I hope - fervently - that my reluctance to have more children isn't viewed as a reflection of my feelings on J.Q. He's the love of my life. Being his mother has been more profound than the greatest (or the schmaltziest) writer could ever express.

My heart is already tethered to his... wound up tight with Kevlar cord. Is it any wonder that it throbs so furiously when he's scared or upset?

That tie will remain even after his hand slips out of mine. It will still hurt. The ache won't - and couldn't - be soothed by the presence of another, tinier hand.

I want these things for us. Having tasted potential, I'll be better suited to describe it to J.Q. Having been suffused with hope and excitement, I'll be able to give them proper reverence.

I want him to dig his fingers into the damp sand on the beach at Pitcairn Island.

I want him to fall in love.

Hands and hearts.

May ours go wherever they wish.

A Birth Story - Pt. III

Pt. I Pt. II Pt. III

1:30 PM : Really, really awful pain is a lot like really, really fantastic sex. You'll have to bear with me on this one.

When ratcheted up to a certain level, both agony and ecstasy become more than physical sensations, or even smorgasboards of sensation. Sometimes it's with a wail, sometimes it's with a whisper... but eventually, it all goes supernova. Walls are vaporized, lines of demarcation char and flake away. What you're feeling is everything, everywhere. A whole world in a cramped single bed. Indianapolis to Indochina in the creases of the sheets.

It is a plane of existence with overeager hands and sharp fingernails. All your running, writhing and caterwauling only tighten its grip.

In the case of pleasure, of course you want to press against it. Tension begets tension, and tension is delicious. Friction begets friction, the kind that urges you a little deeper down the rabbit-hole, that twists your hair a bit tighter around its fist.

This is not a sex story, however. That was nine months ago. It is now a labor story, and to say that the context has changed would earn you the Understatement of the Year Award, as well as a soul-cauterizing stare of incredulity from our protagonist.

Three and a half hours have passed. "... in the blink of an eye" wouldn't be exactly right… nor would "... the longest fucking three and a half hours not directed by James 'Mammoth, Barnacle-Encrusted Ego' Cameron".

The fourth dimension has lost all importance (as have the other three, the bastards). People, places, things... irrelevant. World events? Of no consequence. There is only pain – pain which cannot be described as "sharp", "dull", "achy", "crampy"... really, by any term other than "omnipresent". Movie villains are perpetually threatening to administer "a world of pain". It would appear that I've relocated to said locale.

Mere minutes after the first squirt of Pitocin trickled down my IV, I thought, "Oh... fuck. Not in Kansas anymore!" A few seconds after that? "Okay, champ... so how do we hold it together until we get back to the farm?" Yes, my conscious mind talks like a high school football coach. It gives my superego the occasional hearty ass-slap, too.

You don't fight against the pain. That would exacerbate it a hundredfold. You don't tense - feel those fingers against your trachea? Do you really want them to dig any deeper? You don't cry, scream, rend your hospital gown or fling your whale song CD across the room like a rainbow-festooned throwing star.

You make like Modest Mouse - you float on. You make like Jeff Spicoli - you surf. You make like Ron Jeremy and you ride that bitch... as long. And as hard. As it fucking takes.

How I discovered this, I haven't the slightest idea. Luck and desperation, most likely. But for the past few hours, I've relaxed my body, focused my mind and managed to perch atop the wave of contractions. I'm still in the ocean. But thankfully, amazingly, I'm not going under.

Balance? Not me. Born a klutz. Perpetually speckled with bruises. Fear of drowning and Dodge Caravan-sized squid kind of precluded surfing. Never really cool enough to mount a skateboard. Failure to master the art of skipping earned me amazed scorn and a "NEEDS IMPROVEMENT" from my preschool gym teacher.

And yet here I am. I've found the balance. Didn't even bash my forehead against the doorjamb while looking for it.

Breathe, relax, be still. Be quiet. Go inward. Totally in. Ouroburos ain't got nothing on you. Breathe.

Breathe.

Medical personnel wander in and out. They adjust the electronic fetal monitor, ask questions I refuse to answer and increase my Pitocin levels. Baby-Daddy hovers, anxious, sympathetic and (thankfully) silent. I surf the pain, primarily from the confines of my bed. Visits to the bathroom, while soothing (lots of cool tile and industrial disinfectant), are curtailed by the nurses ("Let's try to keep these trips closer to five minutes than fifteen", chastizes one).

Amazingly, even from deep within the maelstrom of pain, my elementary school Voice of Shame is still quite audible.

"YOU HAVE TO MAKE SURE NOT TO POOP WHILE PUSHING!" it instructs at one point, "THAT WOULD BE EVEN WORSE THAN THE TIME YOU DRANK TOO MUCH CHOCOLATE MILK BEFORE LIBRARY HOUR AND WOUND UP PEEING YOURSELF AGAINST THE CARD CATALOGUE!"

"IS YOUR BUTT HANGING OUT?" it inquires at another point. I'm on the floor, on my hands and knees, rocking back and forth and counting backwards by fives.

I was walking back to bed following an illicit bathroom break; the pain spiked before I got there. Voice of Shame is highly amused. "I THINK YOUR BUTT'S HANGING OUT! WATCH OUT, FOLKS, THERE'S A FULL MOON OVER THE LABOR PAVILION!", it crows. "Seventy-FIVE, seventy, sixty-FIVE, SHUT UP!", I say.

After a few minutes, I pull myself back upright. I clumsily remount the bed. I prop myself up on my hands. I relax, and I breathe.

1:50 PM : Garbo ain't got nothin' on me. After hours of nothing but hissed breaths and tiny sighs, I finally speak.

"This... can't... continue," I tell Baby-Daddy. My face is chalk-white, my eyes wide. I've been surfing, surfing hard... and suddenly, without warning, I feel like I'm about to be pulled under. A few minutes ago, I inadvertently tensed up; the pain became indescribably worse. I'm worried that I won't be able to stop myself from doing it again. It's going to happen. And it's going to swallow me.

"You want me to tell the doctor?" he asks, taking my hand. I nod mutely.

1:55 PM : "Let's see if you're dilated enough for an epidural!", chirps Dr. Professional, "Hopefully you'll be up to four or five, so we can get the anaesthesiologist in here". Dr. Professional is an older woman, tidy gray crewcut, all business. She lays me flat, splays my legs... and emits a very uncharacteristic cluck.

"What do you know?", she says, "You're at nine centimeters!"

Huh, I think, that would certainly explain a lot.

Extricating her rubber-gloved hand from my Love Canal, Dr. Professional pauses for a moment. "Whenever you feel like pushing, you just let us know," she says.

Pushing? Pushing, meaning I push out a baby? And this horrific process will be over? My body doesn't feel like pushing... my body feels nothing but wretchedness. My mind, however, ever the sensible party, is settled.

"Now," I say, "I want to push NOW."

TO BE CONTINUED...

A Birth Story - Pt. II

Pt. I Pt. II Pt. III

8:00 AM: State of the Ute Address

Sack o' amniotic goodness: officially breached!
Private room: officially obtained!
General mood: wheeeeeeeee!
Was that a contraction?: fuck, yeah!

The sun is up, the birds are delivering spirited avian renditions of Broadway classics and we are kickin' back in the Labor Suite. The Labor Suite is part of the hospital's brand-new Julius and Ethel Rosenberg Memorial Baby-Poppin' Pavilion. It is nicer than some hotel rooms I've visited. Hell, it may be nicer than my house (my delicate condition having led to a rather indelicate degree of filthiness as of late). My contractions are coming on slowly and leisurely; I'm finding them to be quite manageable. "This is IT?" I think, twining my fingers in the bedsheets and slowly exhaling, "I can deal with THIS!" I'm clutching the sheets – rather than, say, a birthing ball or a soothing CD (Now That's What I Call Atonal Whale Songs! Vol. XI) – due to my ol' bacterial nemesis, Group B Strep. Wondering how that works? Permit me to explain.

GBS leads to IV antibiotics. IV antibiotics lead to – duh – an IV. An IV leads to a restricted range of motion. A restricted range of motion leads to a the medical equivalent of a hazing ritual, wherein a hospital worker says, "Okay, folks, so whadda we got here? A globe? Chained to a pole? What do you say we strap a big, uncomfortable elastic band around that bitch?" A big, uncomfortable elastic band (otherwise known as an electronic fetal monitor) leads to a snarl of wires, which leads to a plug, which leads to a discarded prop from "2001: A Space Odyssey", which is beeping softly next to your bed… which, incidentally, you are not permitted to leave for more than a minute at a time. Eat it, globe. (But don't eat anything else. That's not permitted.)

Am I bitter about the massive, iodine-scented volume of medical intervention to which I've been subject? Slightly – but only slightly. I'm giving birth in a spacious, sanitary private room. The majority of the world's women deliver their babies in conditions which are uncomfortable at best, dangerous at worst. I may be temporarily tethered by latex and discomfort; this doesn't change the fact that I'm a middle-class American, privileged through and through. My annoyance is tempered by gratitude. My excitement is interrupted by the occasional round of fully-bearable abdominal cramping. I breathe deeply, I chat with Baby-Daddy and Mother-In-Law (who has stopped by to lend a little moral support), I sip apple juice from a tiny plastic cup. Everything is going swimmingly... that is, until the arrival of...

9:00 AM: The Pitocin Patrol!

[Disclaimer: exaggerated for comedic effect... but only barely]

Dr. Speculina: "I recommend that we augment your labor with Pitocin. Your water's broken, but you're only a few centimeters dilated. We need to speed things up to make sure we're not putting the baby at risk." [Ed. Note: the longer the labor, the greater the chance of Little Lord Fetus' holding tank being contaminated by GBS germs]

Jul: "Well... um... I've heard some pretty bad stories about Pitocin, so I was kind of hoping to... not..."

Dr. Speculina: "Well, if you WANT to put your baby at enormous risk..."

Jul: "No, no, of course not! I was just wondering if there were any other options, maybe wait a little while and see how things go..."

Dr. Speculina: "I mean, technically, we could jam a manure-crusted garden trowel up there, too, just to 'see how things went'."

Jul: "You're pretty dead-set on the Pitocin, aren't you?"

Dr. Speculina: [glare comparable in frostiness to the one Gloria Steinem would deliver if slapped on the ass and instructed to rustle up a pot roast]

Jul: "Okay! Okay! I give!"

Dr. Speculina: "Eeeeeeexcellent." [whips open white coat, eagerly yanks out baggie of high-grade Columbian "P-Toc".]

[fade to black]

9:30 AM:

Baby-Daddy: "Can I get you some juice?"
Jul: [turns head away, does not respond]
Baby-Daddy: "Do you need some more Chapstick?"
Jul: [turns head away, does not respond]
Baby-Daddy: "Want to sit on your birthing ball for a minute?"
Jul: [silent glare, the intensity of which makes Dr. Speculina's best effort look like that of a puppy begging for a tummy rub]
Baby-Daddy: "Um... whoa... well... do you want us to go to the cafeteria for a little while?"
Jul: [nods vigorously, turns head away]

Poor Baby-Daddy. He'll never really get over the snubbing he's currently enduring. He hates to see me in pain... but he really, really hates not being permitted to help. His forced exodus from the Labor Suite will be the subject of black humor for years to come.

Typical Account of Labor, Jul: "Well, I felt very strongly compelled to focus... without any distractions."

Typical Account of Labor, Baby-Daddy: "So I was like, 'What can I do for you, honey?' And you were like, 'GET OUUUUUUUT!' And I was like, 'Well, can I rub your back?' And you were like, 'GET OUUUUUUUT!' So I was like, 'Is there ANYTHING I can do?' And you were like, 'YES, YOU CAN DIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIE!'"

This account - while amusing - is not entirely accurate. I don't yell, I don't scream. Nor do I speak, or interact in any fashion beyond the occasional blistering glare. My demeanor can best be described as a charming amalgam of autistic and homicidal. Baby-Daddy and Mother-In-Law slowly creep out the door, praying that the squeak of their shoes on linoleum doesn’t cause my spooky, silent wrath to flare.

10:00 AM: Pit of Despair

Ah, Pitocin. Ol’ buddy, ol’ pal. How I wish to draw you near, to hold you in my arms… to squeeze you… harder… and harder… and HARDER…

Pitocin is a synthetic form of oxytocin, a hormone released naturally during childbirth (as well as many other non-agonizing moments, such as breastfeeding and orgasm). Per the manufacturer (Merck), faux-tocin is intended to “[produce] the rhythmic uterine contractions characteristic to delivery”. Like Baby-Daddy’s characterization of my behavior during labor (“Do you want some whale songs?” “THE WHALES SHOULD ALSO DIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIE!”), this is both hilarious and a teeny, tiny, eensy-weensy bit inaccurate.

Well, let me rephrase. It’s a fucking lie.

The contractions characteristic to a natural, non-augmented delivery wax and wane. They begin slowly, then build in frequency and intensity. They feature a well-defined beginning, middle and end; it is this nifty “end” feature which allows the laboring woman to relax, breathe deeply, listen to Shamu belting out “Inagaddadavida” and prepare for the next onslaught.

Synthetic oxytocin is not released in dribs and drabs. It is delivered at a steady clip via infusion pump, the dosage increased every half-hour or so until a “desired labor pattern is achieved”. In many cases – and certainly in mine – “desired labor pattern” is a euphemism for “slavering hellhound of a contraction which gnaws at your uterus like it’s a goddamned Booda Bone. For hours. Houuuuuuuuuuuuurs.”

It’s brutal, exhausting and unrelenting. It’s also, as I discovered quite by accident, entirely endurable.

TO BE CONTINUED...

A Birth Story - Pt. I

Pt. I Pt. II Pt. III

4:00 AM : oh, not again... not again not again not again. Soft indigo light wafts through the mini-blinds, birds sleepily practice their scales... and I have to pee. My requests for an extra-extra long homemade catheter having been thwarted ("Do you know how disgusting it would be to trip over a fifteen-foot long tube of urine?"), I must lamentably get up. I yawn, fling aside blankets and begin the long dismount. I am 38 weeks pregnant, an unwieldly pink globe. Much like "Kirby" from the classic Nintendo game, jellybean-devouring proclivities and all. While Kirby was capable of unassisted flight, however, I'm incapable of taking a whiz without an intricate series of contortions. I wriggle to the left... wriggle to the right... inch my hips towards the edge... and finally, thank Yaweh, slide off the bed. I manage to take a single step towards the bathroom before feeling a tiny gush of warmth. My underwear's soaked. My eyes are wide. "Well," I think, brain whirring like an overtaxed hard drive, "My life thus far has been mercifully free of urinary incontinence. This... might... mean something."

4:15 AM : some people panic in an emergency. Some lead, some follow. Others shut down. Geek that I am, I troubleshoot. Which might explain my current position - pantsless and crouched above a paper towel. Might as well use the scientific method, I muse, retrieving the towel. It's stained with pale pink fluid. Pee? No. Female ejaculate? I wish. "Well, it ain't Crystal Lite," I mutter, sealing my rosy specimen in a Ziplock bag and sliding it into the fridge for safekeeping.

4:30 AM : The Best E-Mail Our Heroine Has Ever Composed

Sent: 04/__/05
To: Jul's Boss
Subject: I Will Not Be In Today...
Body: ... and I think you know why. Thx.

4:45 AM : "... and then I collected some on a towel? And it LOOKED kinda, um, amniotic?" On the other end of the line, my obstetrician yawns. "Yeah, you're going to want to head in." "Now? Like, right now?" I say. My doctor murmurs his assent. Some months earlier, I'd tested positive for Group B strep. GBS is a member of the "common-yet-rogueish" subset of infectious agents (such as escheria "E-Dogg" coli). 25% of the population harbors GBS at any given time; it's generally an innocuous little beastie. Under certain circumstances, however (such as the gooey operetta of childbirth), GBS rages out of control. It throws a microscopic keg party which grows way too large, way too rapidly. An infection that boisterous can be problematic... sometimes fatally so. As as result, Group B strep carriers generally receive IV antibiotics during labor. Which - if the telltale towel is any indicator - I've just begun. Surprise!

5:15 AM : these are my last moments as a childless individual. Do I panic? Do I ponder? Do I laugh? Do I cry?

No. I waddle into the kitchen and devour a protein bar. "No eating during labor?" I sneer, "My hormone-bloated ass!" It is not my most flagrantly defiant move as a patient; that honor belongs to "removing own stitches after oral surgery." Nonetheless, brushing soy crispies from my chin, I feel a twinge of pride.

Or is that a contraction?

6:00 AM : Rousing the Baby-Daddy

"Psssst!"
"Whuuuu?"
"Pssssst!"
"Whaddisit?"
"Um... I think my water broke!"
"Huh? What?"
"We have to go to the hospital!"
"Ohhhhhhhh. Really? Wow. Do you feel anything?"
"Maybe a twinge? I think?"

6:15 AM : the Toyota MR2 is a fun, feisty little death trap; a Hot Wheel-sized convertible with plenty of pickup and not much side-impact protection. I have no way of knowing if I'm the only laboring woman who has ever arrived at the hospital via MR2... but I secretly hope so.

"Uh... so how are we getting the baby home?" I ask, attempting to hoist myself from one of Ladybug's deep bucket seats.

Earlier that week, my Accord had thrown an uncharacteristic mechanical wobbly. We weren't pleased, but as my due date was two weeks away, we'd assumed it would be off of jacks and back in action in plenty of time.

"Well... huh. I guess we borrow a car... or rent one... or something?" ventures Baby-Daddy. We giggle nervously. Sure, there are disadvantages to having kids early in life. But the ability to shrug off "lack of non-deathtrap vehicle" as "Eh, Something That Kinda Sucks, But Not Too Bad"? Priceless. We grab my suitcase and lock up Ladybug. Holding hands, we walk towards Baby Mill Memorial Hospital's automatic double-doors and our new lives.

7:00 AM :

"First, do no harm" - Hippocrates
"Another day, another potential malpractice suit" - Baby Mill Memorial

It is a squat suburban behemoth, acres and acres of tidy brick and close-cropped grass.

As you turn into the hospital's main entrance, an LED sign cheerily informs you that "BABY MILL MEMORIAL HAS DELIVERED ___ BABIES THIS YEAR!" It's early spring. "___ " already requires a comma. Ushering a new life into the world has historically been a sticky, erratic business. Baby Mill Memorial holds no truck with all of that. It is their aim to ensure that each infant arrives as smoothly and predictably as a new Volkswagen rolling off the line.

"No, you can't do that."

I hear it within minutes of being admitted. I'll hear it dozens - perhaps hundreds - of times over the next several days. It is by virtue of exhaustion alone that I refrain from shivving an allied health worker in the ass with a sharpened otoscope.

Minutes after trundling up to the intake desk, I am tagged, classified, handed a standard one-ply hospital gown and parked in a semi-private waiting area. Triage Terrace features an uncomfortable-ass molded plastic chair, an uncomfortable-ass bed (to which I'm promptly confined) and several pieces of relentlessly benign wall art ("Thomas Kinkade Tossses Back Too Many Brandy Alexanders and Spews All Over the Canvas"- 2005). Baby-Daddy and I crack jokes as nurses bustle about... filling out forms, recording vital signs, taking fluid samples, denying any and all requests.

"Um... I really have to go to the bathroom...".

"Can't do that."

"But I - "

"We're still waiting for your lab results. Here, use this."

Baby-Daddy is handed a gleaming metal bedpan. We stare at each other in mute horror. Somehow, this is not what we envisioned when we sealed our love with fifty orders of Poulet Chasseur and "'til death do us part."

Nurse Wretched scurries away. We manage to position my lower half atop the bedpan - an operation not unlike squeezing a banacle-crusted freighter into dry dock - and I am granted sweet, sweet urinary relief. After a hearty sigh of relief, I reach over my globe, delicately dab my female region... and pull back a prop from "Saving Private Ryan". I stare at the handful of bloody goo, shocked. "Damn it, look somewhere else!" I tell Baby-Daddy. "Good news, it looks like your water DID break!" says Nurse Wretched, stepping through the (semi-)privacy curtain. "Ummmn... YEAH," I mutter, displaying my palmful of gore.

TO BE CONTINUED...

The Infideli-Diaries - Pt. IV (B)... Over and Done With

Pt. I / Pt. II / Pt. III / Pt. IVa / Pt. IVb

Infidelity Lesson #8 : you've heard it from health teachers, public service ads and that one weird friend who always winds up nursing a Yoo-Hoo while the other partygoers embalm themselves with ethanol.

"You don't do things drunk that you wouldn't otherwise do sober... it removes inhibitions, not free will."

This may or may not be true. I certainly hope it isn't. The "facial lacerations due to impromptu pole-dancing" incident, for example. I'd feel a lot better if that could be credited solely to Captain Morgan's sadistic little parrot.

When applied to infidelity, however, it’s dead accurate.

You don’t do things with your crotch that you haven’t already done with your mind. The aching tension leading up to sex can be more pleasurable than the act itself. The somewhat-different tension leading to infidelity can - and is - infinitely more damaging than the act itself.

There are few blissfully happy philanderers. There are plenty who claim to be, but they’re delusional, psychopathic or a zesty combination of the two. There’s always… something. Nagging doubt. A tiny stone in the shoe. “What if?” The act itself may seem startling, like a pissed-off wasp in the living room. But guess what? Somebody had to leave that window open in the first place.

It’s not a disease, it’s a symptom. Illicit sex and lies aren’t capable of creating long-standing marital unease… but they’re damned good at laying it bare.

It’s not a stain, it’s a solvent… like alcohol, or turpentine. The things it leaves aren’t nearly as important as the things it strips away. Self-delusion, doubt, avoidance, complacency, capitulation… the thin film holding the whole rickety contraption together… gone, baby. Gone.

(Free will? That, you keep. Compliments of the house and/or a laissez-faire supreme being).

No matter which side of the triangle you're on... no matter who you love, who you're fighting for, who you grope... you're grasping at ghosts.

---

By the time the big revelation dropped, it seemed laughably small. "That... that was it?" marvelled my then-husband, "I thought you'd, like, killed somebody or something."

It was a tiny and hellish circle of awkwardness, that morning... something scribbled in the margins of Dante's notebook. Soon to be separated, we'd spent our respective weekends cheerfully vow-breaking. We hadn't expected this. I hadn't expected a crisis of conscience. He hadn't expected that I'd return home early, discover him and his girlfriend snoozing, tearfully demand her ejection from the marital abode.

Exhausted, minorly-unhinged, snot- and mascara-smeared... it wasn't one of my better moments. It's one of my favorites, however. It was the morning I finally knew that my husband and I were no longer together, in any sense of the word.

---

"... that was it?"

I was huddled under a blanket on our bed, intermittently crying and yawning. My soon-to-be-ex was sitting next to me, patting my hair, attempting to get to the bottom of my unpleasant little surprise visit. After an hour of false starts ("Swingers' convention? What?"), I finally 'fessed up.

"What do you mean, 'that was it'?" I squeaked, "I slept... with... a married guy! That's not a good thing! That's not me! At least I thought it wasn't!"

"Was this before, during or after the swingers?" he asked, half-yawning, half-sighing.

"Um... before. It was a busy weekend," I said, squeezing my eyes shut." In true type-A form, I'd kicked off the revelry early. The weekend's first conquest occurred far from the woods, on scratchy industrial carpet... with the infamous Mr. Married. My conscience apparently hadn't enjoyed things quite as much as my body. If I'd known that Married would be part of my life for months to come, my sunburnt little head might've just exploded.

My husband's head seemed detonation-ready itself... with exhaustion, frustration and... was that... boredom? "I guess I don't see what the big deal is... why you're reacting the way you are."

"I didn't think I was like that... like... y'know..."

He sighed, patted my head, muttered something vaguely reassuring. I nuzzled my sticky face into the pillowcase, felt sleep begin to slide across my shoulders... the most unambiguously welcome touch of the weekend.

Just as it all went blurry, it all became clear.

He wasn't particularly interested.

He was concerned... sort of. He was worried... a bit. He was bemused by the seemingly-unremarkable source of my hysterics.

But he wasn't interested... not in rug burns, sordid details or existential crises.

I'd raged against infidelity all along... but it wasn't the problem. I'd lost him long before he'd found someone else. He could spend hours with her and still crave more. He couldn't spent five minutes with me without growing bored. It wasn't me. It wasn't him. It was us. We could date, marry, even raise a child... but we couldn't summon up an iota of heat between us. And why do we cheat, if not to re-spark the fire in our own eyes, and to see something kindred in another's?

"Howyoudoing?" he asked, breaking our lull.

"Think I'm a little bit better," I muttered, curling into a ball and closing my eyes. It was an awful morning which ended like a fantastic night... tired and sticky, bruised and confused, slipping simultaneously into sleep and something which might just be understanding.

Infidelity Lesson # 9 : to thine own self be true. All others, take on a case-by-case basis.

If you must pick one virtue from the pantheon... choose kindness. Try to wheedle your way into two or three... but if it must be one, kindness.

Never say never. Never say never again. Never let your guard or your expectations down, unless you'd like a surprise confrontation with Nevers #1 and #2.

Even if you've cheated for the entire game, deal that last hand honestly. Forgiveness. Top-down. One for them... one for you.



Credits: special thanks to M., S., R., and M. ... couldn't have done it without you (insert double-entendres where appropriate). Enormous flaming kudos to my family (for not disowning me), for my friends (for being wise and patient in light of my sporadic idiocy/immaturity) and the internets (your comments are like Good Dog's sweet potato fries... sweet soul-sustenance with a side of garlic aioli). Extra-special shout-out to Bob Mould and Sugar, whose "Changes" has been on perma-loop throughout the entire Infideli-Diaries.

The Infideli-Diaries - Pt. IV (A)

Pt. I / Pt. II / Pt. III / Pt. IVa / Pt. IVb

"Well here we go again, you've found yourself a friend, that knows you well
But no matter what you do, you'll always feel as though you tripped and fell
So steady as she goes"
- Raconteurs, "Steady As She Goes"

Suburbiaville's sleeping. The birds are silent, the grass slicked with dew. The sun has just peeked above the Target sign. The August humidity will be brutal in a few hours; right now, the air's just the tiniest bit shimmery... sexy underwear in fog format. Thanks to a few early-rising type-As, the town's parfum is an intoxicating combo of gasoline and fresh-mowed lawn. I breathe deeply. Rest my head on the steering wheel. Count backwards from ten. Then scream.

"FUUUUUUUUUUUCK!"

At an hour when most people have yet to pay a visit to Mr. Coffee, my world has already disintegrated into ludicrous intensity. Some people are prisoners in their own homes. I'm a prisoner outside of mine. My husband's boxy little SUV sits in our driveway. Snuggled alongside it is a shiny, unfamiliar sedan. While I can't tell for sure, I strongly suspect that the vehicles' owners are similarly snuggled... sharing the same IKEA mattress which has been brutalizing my spine for years. Me? I'm parked across the street, bawling in a dumpy little Civic. I have a set of house keys. I've got my name on the mortgage statement. I've got more irrational fury than a squad of drunken strippers. I've got every right to go in the house. I need - more than anything, it seems - to go in the house. So why can't I seem to move?

---

It's Sunday, six o'clock AM. I was ostensibly meant to spend this weekend camping - communing with nature, unburdening my soul to sympathetic squirrels. While camping did occur, it was by no means the defining event of the weekend. The previous forty-eight hours were, bar none, the most debauched of my young life. There was rum 'n Coke, sex 'n drugs, bad and really, really bad. Boundaries were pushed. Taboos were flaunted. The word (well, make that "pseudo-word") "WOOOOO!" was utilized, unironically and repeatedly. Milestones were reached, celebrated, lasciviously rubbed against.

My first solitary weekend since my son's arrival.

My last weekend before moving out on my own, turning the already-massive disconnect between my husband and myself into something tangible.

The first time in years that I'd violated my personal code of ethics.

The first time I'd - so help me god - semi-inadvertently attended a swinger's convention.

The last time I would turn to my spouse when crisis hit.

---

I wasn't due home until Sunday evening. At four o'clock in the morning, however, I reached a point of bucolic breakdown. I was hungover, sunburnt, confused, teary-eyed, alarmingly sore. I was in dire need of comfort - of both the "emotional" and "sleeping surface not studded with chisel-like rocks" varieties. Under the guise of "having to write about that cah-raaaaazy swingers' convention", I busted down my tent, bid farewell to my companions and hit the highway.

I drove home at roughly the same rate that I drove myself out of my mind… which is to say, terrifyingly fast. “I’m not even sure who I am anymore,” I muttered, rhythmically clenching and unclenching the steering wheel, “Who the fuck does these things? Me, apparently? What was with the swingers? Why did I whip off my top? Why did I do that? And that? Do I hate myself? Should I?”

The Pennsylvania Turnpike was an endless ribbon of industrial ugly. The sunrise was Thomas Kinkade by way of Egon Schiele, freakishly luminous smears of orange and gray. They were a perfect external complement to the contents of my head, which grew progressively nastier over the course of the two-hour drive. By the time I screeched to a halt in front of Thumbscrews Manor, I was a twisted, smoking wreck.

"I need my husband," I hiccuped, wiping my eyes on my tank top... then catching sight of the other car. Her car.

And whaddya know... apparently, so does someone else.

Life in the Thumbscrews household has been monumentally awkward over the past several months. We are bright kids, both fully aware that we're separating (and most likely divorcing). We're attempting to remain civil during this odd interstitial period, both for our small son and our sanity. We've given one another our blessings; our respective extracurricular activities now occur sans subterfuge. I've been staging my own controlled-scale rendition of "Girls Gone Wild". He's been seeing OtherWoman at every opportunity. Despite occasional spots of friction ("So... who'd you do for lunch today?"), things have been strangely copacetic. I shouldn't be surprised (I'm not due back for another 12 hours! Those crazy kids are in love!). Nor should I be infuriated (my own "camping trip" having featured more penises than squirrels).

So why am I falling apart?

---

"Pick up your phone! Pick up your phone! I need you, fuckstick!" I mash the numbers into my cell again... by my count, this is the eighteenth time. At this point, I'm actively arguing with his voicemail . "You can't pick up the phone right now? Can't pick it up because, oh yeah, you're fucking someone else? Pick up anyway! Never stopped Paris Hilton! And she's got her own fragrance! Do you have your own fragrance? 'Eau de Fuckstick', perhaps?"

And so it goes. Spew bile at a prerecorded greeting. Wail into the upholstery. Hate my husband. Hate myself. Hate my car ("I'll bet the backseat of an Accord would be big enough for me to properly curl up and die!").

I decide to get a hotel room. HBO, clean white sheets, $15 club sandwiches... these niceties may very well stave off total jibbering insanity. I drive to the local Holiday Inn, only to find that frugality trumps self-preservation. "Eighty bucks to sleep two miles from my own damned house? Hell, no... I'll show you where to stick your so-called Continental breakfast...muffins, nothing but muffins... always..." I sniff, driving back home.

On a whim, I activate the tiny SUV's car alarm. The neighbors are annoyed. The lovebirds are not roused.

I decide to seek guidance from above. I've never held much truck with Yahweh. Radio waves, however, are a different story.

Seconds after flicking on the radio, I start giggling.

"Steady as she goes," advises Jack White, "So steady as she goes."

I love this song. Always have. I also love "Under Pressure", which immediately follows.

"This is our last dance... this is our last dance... this is ourselves... under pressure."

When Jack White tells you to stay steady, you stay steady. When Freddie Mercury tells you to jump, you say, "How high?" Or perhaps, "How fabulous?" Whatever the case may be... you take action.

I walk up to the door and ring the bell. Seconds later, my husband appears, bleary-eyed and bathrobe-clad.

"Huh? Why aren't you camping? What's wrong?"

Tears immediately dribble down my face. "I had to come back. Muh-make her go home. Right now," I sob.

Amazingly... he does.

ROUSING CONCLUSION COMING SOON...

The Infideli-Diaries - Pt. III

Pt. I / Pt. II / Pt. III / Pt. IVa / Pt. IVb

She had a heartful of love and devotion
She had a mindful of tyranny and terror
Well, I try, I do, I really try
But I just err, baby, I do, I error
So come find me, my darling one
I'm down to the grounds, the very dregs
Ah, here she comes, blocking the sun

- Nick Cave, "Do You Love Me?"

Infidelity Lesson #6 : the Bad and Ugly aspects of infidelity do not blot out the Good, whether it's emotional, physical or an amalgam. People don't cheat because it makes them feel awful... they cheat because it makes them feel fantastic.

Remember chicken pox? You'd examine the situation afterwards, marveling at how you could've knowingly inflicted that much damage. At the time, however.... giving in, scratching that itch, feeling the release... the potential for a few little scars seemed so, so worth it.

---

There are aspects of gastronomy which would seem right at home in a sleazy horror movie. From foie gras to Frank Perdue, humans have a well-documented history of brutalizing our intended dinner. Unparalleled in the annals of animal cruelty, however, is the treatment of the ortolan. This diminutive songbird is a legendary French delicacy. Its method of preparation is also legendary, so uniquely sadistic that the bird's sale is officially banned. Banned, my friends, by a nation that has celebrated both Jerry Lewis and the guillotine. Clearly, the ortolan's fate is a good deal darker than that of your average Oven Stuffer Roaster.

Death is merciful. Those who would dine on the ortolan, however, are not. Thus, the bird is taken alive. Depending on the whim of its captors, it is either blinded or kept in constant darkness (in order to disturb its sleep/wake cycles). It is force-fed a rich diet of oats, millet and figs. When sufficiently plump (up to four times its initial size), it is drowned in a snifter of Armagnac. It's tossed in the oven for a few minutes ("rare" comes quickly for something the size of a dinner roll), then removed and placed before the diner. It is at this point, startlingly enough, that the whole too-hot-for-Food-TV Grand Guignol really gets interesting.

The crackling-hot ortolan does not pass go. It goes not collect $200. It does not relax atop a bed of herbed couscous.

It is deposited directly in the diner's mouth. Whole. Skin and bone, muscle and miscellany. And how might this sadistic little snackie taste?

Apparently, transcendental. Firsthand accounts tend to disintegrate into theatricality mere seconds after, "... I closed my lips." It's all succulent aromas, rivulets of ambrosial juice, tiny explosions of multisensory bliss.

It’s one of the Western world's greatest culinary adventures. And - contrary to what Visa commercials might have you believe - it can only be bought with cruelty. You get fifteen minutes of carnivorous ecstasy. A shy little warbler gets a week of suffering. This is an openly-acknowledged aspect of ortolan-lore. One consumes the bird with a napkin over one's head, the better to "hide your cruelty from the sight of God".

Do you do it? Do you understand and acknowledge the cost... and still open your mouth? Or do you take the moral high road and order the trout?

I know what I'd do. I don't fully like or understand it... but there's no question as to my decision.

Modern moral dilemmas are so rarely black-and-white. We're haunted by our actions, our inactions, and our ambivalence. Perhaps it's easier for some - people who are more confident, less thoughtful, stronger-willed... maybe just "better". Of course you don't eat the ortolan. You don't cheat on your taxes. You don't court avoidable catastrophes. You never, EVER sleep with someone else's spouse.

And then there are the rest of us. Standing in front of the bathroom mirror, cheeks flushed with shame. Listening to this eminently-correct lecture float through the walls. Laughing and crying as we floss bits of wickedness from between our teeth.

---

For an activity directly contrary to the DeBeers Corporation’s primary mission (wedded bliss and walnut-sized solitaires for all!), infidelity has a hell of a lot of facets.

It can be spun as monstrous, selfish acting out. Fucking your girlfriend in the same bed where your wife routinely cries herself to sleep. Sending your lover home to his wife with the faintest of scratches still traversing his back. A horribly decadent mash-up of larceny and gluttony; taking another man's daily bread for your own frivolous midnight snack.

It can be viewed as a tiny and perverse act of self-heroism, as per Nietzsche, Ayn Rand, the entire back catalogue of Rush lyrics. Raging against the machine, the status quo and the dying of the light. Daring to take a tumble down the rabbit hole, safety, sanity and decorum be damned. Striving for something better, hotter, more dangerous, more interesting, more... more. EAT ME and DRINK ME, indeed.

It can seem inevitable. If you live in a first-world nation, your comfort and happiness hinge in large part upon others' suffering. The factory-farmed chicken you eat for dinner. The child laborer in Laos who stitched your $5 t-shirt. The solider who stepped on a land mine to ensure that you'd be able to refuel your Range Rover on the cheap. The guy working in a sheetrock factory in Arkansas for fifty years, destroying his body so that you can live in a house ten times the size of his apartment. "MADE IN CHINA" (in a sweatshop). "MADE IN THE USA" (ditto).

Why does infidelity seem worse than shopping at The Gap? Because it's a conscious choice, for one. Those who remain oblivious to the human cost of their comfort can be accused of apathy at worst. Adulterers are more purposeful in their flirtation with (and seduction of) disaster. Then there's the "indulgence" angle. Covering one's ass is a necessity (albeit not in stain-resistant microfiber). The rewards of infidelity are pure decadence... vulgar luxuries of the worst stripe.

Or are they?

---

Infidelity Lesson #7 : minimizing the importance of [love / sex / affection / companionship / compatibility] in your relationship is a damned good way to ensure that it metastasizes into something hugely important later on down the line.

I’m sorry for so many reasons. Committing grand larceny of the romantic sector. Violating the trust of an innocent party. Letting my various "issues" overgrow, snaking out tendrils while I hid behind a gauzy curtain of pleasure.

Do I regret it? Do I view it as a stupid accident? Do I think for a second that it was preventable? No, no and no. If I’ve learned nothing else, it’s that patience and moral fortitude alone are not enough to soothe certain aches.

May you never ache that deeply. May you never need so ravenously. May you never have to choose between your principles and your sanity.

It’d be an exaggeration to say that he saved my life... although during several pitch-black nights of the soul, he was the mini-Maglite which held me over 'til morning. He was a friend, a confidante, a voice of reason, and an ideal psychological sounding board. Because of him, I'm a little stronger, a little saner. I have a slightly-clearer idea of what I want from my relationships and my life. My MP3 collection has been greatly enriched. I am much, much better in bed.

"I want a boyfriend-lite. Or maybe a lover-deluxe," I told him shortly after we met. That may've been coyness on my part... but I got all of that, and immeasurably more.

His wife got betrayed.

She'll never find out. How do I know? I just do, implicitly. The layer of abstraction disturbs me. I'm not sure if it makes the crime less odious, or if it only makes it seem that way. Was it like swiping CDs from Best Buy... or like slipping the ortolan a Valium before going to town on it? It was neither of these, and nothing else I can analogize, either.

It was, as you might imagine, complicated.

He had needs. I had needs. I'm not going to diminish them via description... "Sex" can have a million and a half connotations. "Companionship" and "affection", when absent for sufficient time, can produce the kind of bone-deep, screaming cravings usually associated with narcotics. One can withdrawal from all sorts of things... and that itch, that maddening fucking itch, is always present.

I was uniquely suited to scratch his. He excelled at scratching mine. There was never any question of him leaving his wife - he was clearly in love, albeit a darker and more complicated form of it than is typical. I managed to keep my feelings trimmed back to a bonsai-like level of manageability. One does not endure a lifetime of frustrated crushes without acquiring a few useful skills. It was a contradiction in terms: a cautious, carefully-controlled leap into lustful abandon. We knew damned well what we were doing.

But. And yet. However. Of fucking course.

We didn't discuss the "other" activities... we were so comfortable with one another that they just naturally blossomed. We'd steal long, conversation-packed lunches together whenever possible... chicken fingers and Immanuel Kant. We'd e-mail each other our favorite new songs. We'd send late-late night text messages, wryly bemoaning the state of our [bar / party / apartment / life]. We were, indeed, lovers deluxe, super-plus, with a side of fries and burgeoning tenderness.

It wasn’t guilt which separated us, although there had been the occasional shame-fueled stab at moral conduct. It wasn’t discovery – as stated, his wife didn’t (and won’t) find out. It wasn’t that things grew dull – one of the lurid little pleasures of infrequent liaisons is that the excitement retains a Twinkie-like shelf life.

It was the exact same thing which had driven us together – complacency.

When you’re scratching an itch, you’re thinking about how fantastic it feels, how long you can keep it going. The one thing you’re generally not considering is, "Gee... why was I so itchy in the first place?"

That’s the paradox of infidelity. As long as you’re getting those needs fulfilled elsewhere, you’re not addressing their original absence. Why deal with the unpleasantness of confronting deep, potentially-catastrophic problems which could blow apart your marriage? Why bother opening yourself up, making yourself emotionally-vulnerable, getting back on the horse than threw you... dating someone with whom things could get – dun dun DUN! - Serious? It’s warm and cozy in this bed, and we could keep our heads under the blanket for a long, long time. There’s fiddling while Rome burns, and there’s fiddling around while your not-entirely-satisfactory lives remain stagnant.

Perhaps it’s due to my own moral relativism. However, that revelation produced more shame than the initial transgression. We were using this betrayal as a pool float, paddling in place. While nothing excuses infidelity, magma-hot passion comes a damned sight closer than "maintaining the status quo". When doing something that could be described as "morally reprehensible", you desperately want it to mean something. Eating the ortolan seems all the more heinous when you do it casually, washing blood sacrifice down with diet Dew.

We agreed to part ways for a year. The arbitrary-separation idea was derived from Richard Linklater’s sweetly romantic "Before Sunrise"; our reasons were sadder and more pragmatic. "All those doubts and problems," I said, "Everything that’s wrong, everything we’re hiding from... we need to confront it. Beat the living hell out of it."

"Same time, next year?" I said, angrily swiping at my tears, "If neither of our lives have changed at all, you have my permission to kick my goddamned ass."

I miss my friend. I miss the various illicit deliciousnesses we shared. But a little part of me hopes that neither of us show up next year... that we’ve confronted our problems, righted wrongs, inched closer to self-awareness. We’ve gone mano a mano with remorse and forgiveness. We’re finally sated... sans any telltale feathers.

TO BE CONTINUED...

The Infideli-Diaries - Pt. II

Pt. I / Pt. II / Pt. III / Pt. IVa / Pt. IVb

not for vision understood
burns because it has to burn
change'll happen whether we
are still or moving
breathe in waves of doubt
bitter in your mouth

- Toad the Wet Sprocket, "Little Heaven"

Infidelity Lesson #4 : let's say a troubled relationship is like a mouse. It's taken over your house, it's gorged itself on cake mix and Ramen noodles, it's left odious little pellets in its wake. It's making you miserable. It must be addressed.

You could use poisons, traps or barriers.

You could sulk, you could cry, you could talk.

Or you could use the Amorphous Atom Bomb.

The Amorphous Atom Bomb is invisible. It changes position more frequently than a porn star. It has a fuse of indeterminate length; it could go off in two minutes or in two years. It could wipe out your intended target, half a city block… or nothing at all.

Not a good tool for taking down a furry, walnut-sized nuisance, is it?

It's not a good tool for taking down a relationship, either.

---

We're parked in front of our apartment. It's late, really late. Outside, crickets cheep and streetlights glow. Periodically, tractor trailers rumble by and rock our tiny Volkswagen like a German-engineered cradle.

Inside, bombs are dropping.

"Why are you always so unhappy, Jul? Why do you seem like you hate yourself? And why won't you just talk to me? Please… talk to me?" My husband rests his hand on my thigh, looks me dead in the eye and waits. And waits. And waits.

Like all couples, we've got a hit parade of common arguments. Your Laundry-Avoidin' Heart, It's The End of Eating Anywhere But Applebee's As We Know It (And I Feel Gassy). This particular one (She's Suicidally Depressed In Mysterious Ways) has been cropping up with increasing frequency, however. And unlike lesser tunes, it's poised to hit #1 with a bullet.

"You want to know why? You really want to know?"

"Yes! Jesus, Jul… I love you, I don't want you do be miserable… of course I do!"

"A few months after we started dating… I slept with somebody else."

When he responds, my husband's voice is totally flat. Tears, rage, vicious words… anything, anything would be better than the deadness with which he breaks the silence. "Really."

Until this moment, tears had trickling down my face at a leisurely pace, the stream easily dabbed up with a sleeve. I'd also been steadfastly avoiding eye contact. "Yeah," I say, looking up, "Really." As I'm speaking, my voice cracks… then the floodgates do.

I'm sobbing, shaking, howling, curled up like a comma on my sticky leather seat. My husband holds me as best he can, strokes my hair and tries to calm me. He hasn't always been a great husband. I (obviously) haven't always been a good wife. Years later, as our marriage crumbles around us, years of mutual doubts and resentments will come to the surface. Delusions and illusions will fall, and the overall mediocrity of our match will become apparent. However, we'll each retain our moments of pride… briefly transcendental bursts of kindness and compassion.

This is one of them… perhaps the quintessential one. There are pet names, special dinners, surprise parties... and then there's hugging the person who just tossed a grenade in your living room, blowing everything you know to smithereens.

When I have been sufficiently calmed, we fire up the GTI and drive, aimlessly, cruising in a haze of sodium-arcs and tears. We drive and drive and talk and talk. Some details are divulged (it was a one-night stand with a coworker; copious quantities of alcohol were involved). Others are omitted (it was the most exciting thing which had happened to me in a long, long time; with each verboten kiss, pleasant shock and self-loathing battled for space in my head). Only once do we venture close to the true heart of the issue… and, bright young things that we are, we scurry away immediately.

"The thing that really hurts is that you felt like you had to keep a secret from me for half a fucking decade." His voice isn't accusatory… just exhausted, incredulous. "Why? Why couldn't you talk to me?"

I stare out the window. Gas prices are going up again. Home Depot is a giant orange monolith against the night sky. I have no answers… nothing but a swirl of Lovecraftian emotions, immense, unbelievably frightening and lurking just below the surface.

I couldn't talk to you because you don't understand me, and I don't understand you. Because we're radically different people. Because I knew it from the very beginning, but couldn't manage to summon up sufficient balls to end things before I fell in love with you. Because one of the main reasons we're together today – sitting in a Home Depot parking lot, awkwardly crying and cuddling and bumping our elbows on the stick shift – is because I've spent the past five years trying desperately to atone.

Because one of the major reasons I wanted to get married was for absolution… to shoehorn myself into the role of ever-faithful wife.

Because a few years back, a friend gave me some high-grade Ecstasy, a cavalcade of neurological bliss in a tiny foil packet. I wound up tossing it in the trash. I was terrified of "becoming more confessional".

Because it wasn't a moment of blind, overpowering lust. It was an escape attempt. And if the thought of leaving our dull little comfort zone was scary then… it's a thousand times worse now. We're bonded. We're married. And I'm –

I sigh, a shuddery exhalation of defeat. "I'm sorry. I can't. I just can't."

---

Infidelity Lesson # 5 : every infidelity is like a Jerry Bruckheimer movie... it features a well-delineated Before, During and After. You'll spend a good deal longer than 90 minutes reviewing them in your head. Odds are, they'll be a lot more painful than action-packed. As far as Aerosmith-heavy soundtracks go?... we're only addressing forgivable sins here, people.

Don't waste too much time on the After. It's boring. It's predictable. And it's immutable. Afterwards? You'll feel guilty. In some cases, it will be inordinate, debilitating guilt. In others, it will be nothing more than uncomfortable twinges at the periphery of your conscience. Regardless, it will be your burden to bear. Confession is good for one's soul like grand larceny is good for one's wallet - you're forcing someone else to foot your bill. Bearing a painful, shameful secret is difficult - and probably the single-best way to ensure you don't rack up any more of them. As the late, lamented Sherlock Holmes put it, "The example of patient suffering is in itself the most precious of all lessons to an impatient world."

As far as Before? You'd better examine Before like a long-lost Talmudic text. It's important to know why it happened - and not solely to "make sure it never happens again". Contrary to what the Moral Majority (and the moralizing enormity) may believe, cheating is not like washing a red crayon with the white laundry – a thoughtless, simple error, easily preventable in the future. Doing morally-objectionable things is painful. Not really understanding why is infinitely worse.

How did it happen? Why? What factors were present? What facets of life were lacking? It's a question of developing sufficient self-respect, self-awareness and courage to fully face your own motivations. Successfully resisting temptation is small comfort if the temptation occurs again and again and again. Grappling with mutant, super-sized self-loathing is worthless without an equally-intense tussle with introspection.

Fear might keep you from ever touching the flame again.

But it won't explain why you reached out your hand in the first place.

And then there's the illicit, explicit, oft-overlooked During...

TO BE CONTINUED...

The Infideli-Diaries - Pt. I

Pt. I / Pt. II / Pt. III / Pt. IVa / Pt. IVb

"Why would I sabotage / the best thing that I have?
Well it makes it easier / to know exactly what I want"
- Snow Patrol, "Hands Open"

Infidelity Lesson #1 : love, sex, affection and trust are like Legos. They can fit together in a million permutations, or not at all. And when heedlessly trod upon, they hurt like an injection-molded bitch.

If the scornful prognostications of those more moral than I are true, I'm in for a lifetime of romantic misery. My actions have bought the ticket; all that remains is to brace myself for the ride. It's gonna be rough. My jaw will clench, my vertebrae will clatter and my heart will never, ever reach a place of comfort and quiet. I will - god help me - eat alone. Tears and Lean Cuisines, my friends. Tears and Lean Cuisines.

I've been on all three sides of the apocryphal love triangle. I've cheated. I've been cheated upon. And I've been a cheater's cohort.

I'll pause to let you gather stones. Igneous have good gouging potential, while sedimentary are delightfully abrasive. Use this handy rhyme to remember: "Lava-borne? Razor-sharp scorn! From a stream? Bitch, get your Bactine."

I'm the last person you'd expect to be a veteran of the Circus Adulterous. My parents have been happily married for decades (despite the occasional urges to fling cast-iron cookware at each other). Fidelity was an oft-touted virtue in our household, along with "taking a deep breath and counting to ten before whipping a skillet at your partner's big stupid head". My previous menage a monogamy (with The Artist Formerly Known as Mr. Thumbscrews) lasted for a not-unimpressive seven years. "Love triangle"? I'm awful at geometry. I'm even worse at flirting. I have a fairly well-developed moral code, I strive for kindness... hell, I donate money to Planned Parenthood and local LGBT support groups (I like to call it the "Make George W. Bush's Head Explode Like an Overstuffed Pinata Combo Platter").

Infidelity Lesson #2: those who haven't experienced infidelity can't really understand it. Those who have experienced infidelity DEFINITELY can't understand it. Situations involving strong emotion and stronger physical urges are among the messiest imaginable. We may be animals, but we're animals with big, complication-causing prefrontal cortices. For us, even "simple" lust tends to sprawl, fractal-like, into a web of implications, ambiguities and consequences.

This slightly-sordid sexual history could've been the province of almost anyone. Could've - but improbably enough, it belongs to me... someone so socially-stunted that I really ought to scribble "MAKE EYE CONTACT, YOU JACKASS" on the tops of my shoes. I've dipped my toes in the Thames of cheating, and I've flung myself in, headfirst and fully clothed (er... perhaps that's a poor metaphor). Some of my experiences have been unintentional. Some have been horribly deliberate. Some worked out for the best. I'm no longer angry that my (now) ex-husband cheated; the ramifications of that particular act of adultery have been surprisingly positive. Hell, sometimes I feel like buying he and the Future Second Mrs. Jul's Ex a steak dinner out of sheer gratitude. Other experiences, however, have been profoundly negative - moments of spontaneity which resulted in unrelenting shame, bad decisions which led to years of even-worse ones.

There's a damned good reason it's called a "checkered past". Some spots have been black indeed - dangerous little sinkholes of remorse and self-loathing. Others have been transcendentally wonderful. Infidelity is a messy, crowded scene... and sometimes, total surprises pop out from between all the sharp corners and precariously-balanced objects. One expects physical bliss - or at least hopes for it in one's humid little imagination. But compassion, friendship, insight, personal growth? These things aren't probable, but they're possible - and all the more precious, given their imperfect origins.

Daisies from cracked pavement... and existential gratification through moral transgression. I may pay a karmic price for my actions. Some might argue that my recent series of atrocious first dates is merely the beginning, the first circle of interpersonal hell. And - unless the inner circles involve flensing knives and/or couple's therapy - I can accept this.

Guilt? Fuck yes, I've got guilt. I've knowingly betrayed trust. I've been cavalier with people, tossing hearts from hand to hand like snowglobes.

Regret? Now that's trickier.

Infidelity Lesson #3:

Once a cheater... not always a cheater.

But you're not as morally unimpeachable as you think.

Your partner? Definitely not as morally unimpeachable as you think.

There are lessons to be learned in the sleaziest of forums.

There is (sometimes) a squirmy, uncomfortable beauty in the most atrocious of actions.

Learn from your mistakes.

Don't leave the same scars twice.

Don't do things solely to collect stories.

Don't hesitate to tell the stories you already have.

After all... you weren't alone then. And you're definitely not alone now.

TO BE CONTINUED...

The 'Screw Interview : Call & Response

Oh, I still exist, alright... take THAT, oblivion! As promised, here are my answers to The 'Screw Interview.

1. You can travel back in time and visit yourself at [select all applicable] 10, 16, 22 and 30. What would you tell your various temporally-disjointed selves (any hokey "buy stock in Microsoft" replies will be taken out back and accused of antitrust violations)?

10 : you're not brilliant and misunderstood - you're a painfully awkward little girl who really needs to learn how to relate to her peers rather than dishing up a toxic combo platter of fear and disdain.

16 : see above. Also : You're two years younger than your fellow college freshmen. You have a 4.0 GPA. Don't do something stupid like drop out. Pierce your uvula, date the lead singer of a thrash-klezmer band, become a macrobiotic vegan and subsist on sustainably-harvested plankton... but pretty please, with sugar on top... don't drop out.

22 : see above. Also : on August 1st, at approximately 1:30 AM, remember to conceive your son. You'll be terrified at first, but he'll turn out to be a tremendous joy, a gorgeous, sweet, hilarious, revelatory baby, a live wire in footie pajamas. You might want to consider leaving your husband, too… one need not pour it over Wheaties to tell that THAT particular carton of milk has already begun to turn.

Assuming that my words wouldn’t be capable of altering my past selves’ respective courses of action? “You can (and will) experience (and endure) more than you ever thought possible.”

2. Analogy Tyme: if your drug of choice was an item which could be purchased at Home Depot for under $150, which one would be be, and why?

(Ed. Note: there seemed to be some confusion over this one... I meant to pick your ACTUAL favorite drug, then analogize it to a Home Depot item, i.e. "A rototiller, because the dark, impenetrable ditches they produce are eerily similar to the ones gouged in your conscious mind by good ol' veterinary anesthetics").

Ahem.

A Roto-Zip, complete with 30 attachments ("drilling", "gouging", "impassioned shredding", "diamond-cutting", "piping gel-applying", "marital aid", etc). It's dirt cheap and useful in a myriad of situations. And its sleek, injection-molded carrying case makes the user appear WAY sexier than they otherwise would (okay, okay, that one may be a stretch).

3. You can reanimate and spend several hours (say, sharing some Batter-Dipped Choco-Cheesecake Nibblers at the local crap-on-the-walls chain restaurant) with one of the following individuals - which one would you choose, and why?

- A deceased relative of whom you were moderately (but not overwhelmingly) fond.
- A randomly-selected serial killer of moderate notoriety.

Serial killer all the way!

- My family has something of an obsession with serial killers. I have many fond memories of staying up late and watching true-crime shows with my mom... nothing says "togetherness" like a grainy photo of a drainage ditch and a narrator grimly intoning, "... unfortunately for Officer McCloskey, there were STILL MORE fragments of prostitute remaining to be found!"

- I'd be very curious to see which appetizers a serial killer would order... mega-fries (because they're slathered in ketchup)? Chicken wings (because consuming them entails gnawing flesh away from bone)? Riblets (because their preparation involves both harming an animal AND setting something on fire, two components of the Serial Killin' Trifecta [the third is "bed-wetting", but that doesn't go nearly as well with ranch dressing]).

4. Think of your most esoteric, potentially-humiliating sexual fantasy. Think of another, equally-odd (but completely fabricated) fantasy. Describe them both without identifying which is which.

A. I am sitting on the [bus/train/hovercraft], staring into space and wondering if there is some way to combine the deliciousness of mu shu pork with the convenience of Go-Gurt. Just as I’m thinking “Huh, is the name ‘Mu-Tube’ copyrighted?”, the deeply hot gentleman who has been sitting next to me casually shifts his coat onto my lap, slides his hand beneath it, up my leg and under my sensible little Anne Taylor skirt. I neither smack his hand away nor give any outward indication that something is amiss. After a singularly lurid commute, I get up, straighten my disheveled garments and depart without a word.

B. Due to an unfortunate travel mix-up, my trip to Huitzilopochtli Aztec Resort & Spa does not take place. Instead, I find myself stranded among the members of an isolated tropical village, the pervy proclivities of whom make bonobo monkeys look like Morrissey. I am warmly welcomed. Very warmly. The next few weeks are spent cavorting with villagers, handcrafted representations of the lustier tribal gods, sufficiently underripe plantains, etc. Eventually, the state department arrives and spirits me away via helicopter. A single tear trickles down my face as I watch my randy hosts fade into the distance. My state department liaison gives me a sympathetic look, takes my hand in his and says, “Hey… ever done it in an emergency rescue craft?”

5. What is the typical prison sentence for the most legally-questionable act you've ever committed?

Most likely a year or two... nothing terribly titillating and/or reprehensible. Carried a tiny packet containing Unnamed Controlled Substance in my wallet for a few weeks, during which I crossed state lines and visited federal property (not to mention "redefined freaking stupid"). I spent a number of years living with men, so I could've conceivably been co-implicated in a few pieces of boyfriendish stupidity (discharge of unlicensed firearms on private property, the ownership of certain pieces of highly questionable Adult Material, etc). Probably nothing I couldn't have cried my way out of in front of a sympathetic judge.

6. Think of the worst physical pain you've ever experienced (childbirth, ping-pong ball-sized kidney stones, atomic wedgie). Think of the worst emotional pain (depression, divorce, disaster). Think of the person who is closest to you in the world (child, spouse, sibling). You must decide whether they will suffer a comparable degree of physical OR emotional pain. If you choose the former, you will be required to inflict it yourself. If you choose the latter, it will occur without any involvement on your part. Which do you choose?

Physical... definitely. The worst physical pain I've ever felt lasted for seven hours. When it was over, it was over (I ate a pulled pork sandwich, admired my new baby and nagged the nurse to please remove the godforsaken IV). The worst emotional pain lasted for months. Aspects of it still continue to float around my subconscious... phantom wasps, capable of stinging at any moment, sans motivation or provocation. And if J.Q.’s life is half as interesting as I hope it will be, odds are he’ll endure plenty of emotional anguish along the way.

7. You're granted the power to uncover the truth behind one very, very big secret of the modern age - who shot Kennedy? What the hell is the deal with celebrity Scientologists? You will not be permitted to share this knowledge with anyone, ever - it will be solely to satisfy your own curiosity. What do you choose to learn?

Vis a vis big secrets. a few years ago, a friend and I watched “Lost in Translation”. After it ended, I wanted to curl up into a small sphere of hominid and weep for the rest of my natural life, ideally while ethereal indie rock played in the background. My friend, however, was focused on more important matters. “But what did he SAY to her at the end?” he whined, “I really want to know! It’s not fair to leave us hanging like that!” He was unswayed by my repeated protestations of, “That wasn’t the POINT! And why aren’t you sobbing?” Finally, I came up with the perfect answer… wait for it… wait for it… “He told her what was in the briefcase in ‘Pulp Fiction’.”

If I could uncover one non-MacGuffin secret, though, it would have to be “What is the physiological basis for ESP?” I have no doubt that humans possess sensory capabilities not currently acknowledged or understood by medical science. However, I don’t think these abilities are bestowed upon us by mystical/crunchy-granola forces. I think there is a very real scientific basis for them. Our rods and cones enable us to view the world, our cochleae enable us to rock the hell out… but what allows us to see without seeing?

8. While purchasing some plantains at Tienda Mexicano, you find The Lord. You discover that he is a cruel, arbitrary Lord, as well as one who has read entirely too many "Choose Your Own Adventure" books. He takes you outside, sits you down on the hood of his El Camino, hands you a can of Jugo de Coco and informs you that you will never see any of your current loved ones again. They will continue to live their lives, just magically sans any awareness of your continued existence. By way of compensation, you'll be allowed to determine your own natural lifespan. You may elect to die instantly, live to 120 or any option in between. What do you choose? Why?

Assuming I didn’t lapse into hysterical grief at being forever separated from my child… I’d live to be 120. It wouldn’t be as though my loved ones had died - armed with the knowledge that they were living their lives as per usual, I’d do my damndest to survive and thrive. I’d try to embrace the opportunity to start anew, to begin accumulating new memories, new experiences, new relationships.

9. You are given the opportunity to sample human flesh. Your enjoyment of this unusual entree will not be the result of any amoral acts - the source of your Bruce Burger (Tim Tartare? Francois Filet?) will be an individual who has died of unrelated causes. Your consumption of said flesh will not be as a result of starvation, nor as a condition of some sick wager ("Take a chomp out of Lloyd's thigh and I'll give you season tickets to Six Flags Over Highly Unlikely Transactionville"). Yea or nay?

Yea all the way. It’s not something I actively WANT to ingest… but I have a very, very difficult time turning down the opportunity to try anything new and/or novel. My id could best be described as Andrew W.K. (warning! simulated gore!) crossed with Charles Bukowski crossed with Evel Knievel - all gleeful, drunken daredevilishness. And as far as good bar stories go, “… that time I engaged in cannibalism” beats almost everything else, save perhaps “… that time with the identical-triplet strippers in the stolen Popemobile.”

10. You are given a Memory Dustbuster. It looks like a regular Dustbuster, circa 1989. However, when held against the human skull, it has the ability to suck out specific memories. Like many small appliances, this one has gotten a bit finicky in its old age. It no longer removes single memories... for each one which is removed, an equal-but-opposite second memory is also vacuumed up. You can suck out a particularly awful recollection... however, you'll also lose a happy memory of comparable intensity, and you have no say in which one it happens to be.

Do you use this device? How many times?

Nope... no question on this one. I'm grateful for everything I've had a chance to experience... good to awful, incredibly strange to unexpectedly content.

11. The Enormous Glowing Sphere of Influence Equation: how many of the following events have occurred in your life for which you've felt personally responsible? By this, I mean that the event in question would definitely NOT have occurred were it not for one or more conscious decisions on your part. Do NOT include events which were confined strictly to your professional life - thus, lawyers/doctors/matchmakers/executioners/etc. should use their discretion on this one.

- Marriages (1... a number which may increase at some nebulous future point. You never know when Gerard Depardieu might face deportation and require some wacky hijink-laden assistance to remain in the good ol' US of A!)

- Divorces (1... can I get a "booyah!"?)

- Births/adoptions (1, a number which is very unlikely to increase. I love J.Q. more than life itself, and I love parenting him. "Parenting" and "further children", in concept? Not so much).

- Deaths (0... not even Death of a Salesman (too talky), Death By Chocolate (too gooey) or Death Cab For Cutie ("You Will Be Loved" too likely to make me burst into hysterical, exterior AND interior garment-rending tears. You've never ripped off your panties in abject sorrow? Well, lah dee dah for YOU!]).

- Involuntary commitments (mental institution/rehab/prison) (0... have had the opportunity to do so - took a pass each time. Just doing my part to contribute to entropy).

- Relocations of over 1,500 miles (0... two 800-mile jaunts, plus seven or eight local moves, genus "let us express our incredible dumbness NOT by muttering 'duh, duh' or running while clutching shish-kebab skewers, but by boxing up everything we own and hauling it up and down several flights of stairs in the blistering sun!").

- Ascension to a level of fame/renown/power sufficient to interest/impact more than 10,000 individuals. (1/0). That's "one OR zero", not a divide-by-zero error, the bane of my tech-supportin' existence. Microsoft Excel, while a fine spreadsheet application indeed, has the eerie ability to convince users that logical impossibilities are not only possible, but should've been possible FIVE MINUTES AGO WHEN THIS REPORT WAS DUE DAMN IT. If I never again utter the words, "Okay, so if you divide FIVE apples by ZERO apples, you get what? You can't? Yes, that's right, and neither can Excel!"... it will be too soon.
Ahem... according to my trusty Sitemeter, Thumbscre.ws itself may count... but I'm wondering if the caveat "level of MILD interest, as a result of poop joke-telling prowess" should remove this one from contention).

- Change in income level of +/- 50% (1... my own. I started working at Indentured Servicorp Discount Tech Support when I was seventeen. As it turned out, they would make my life utterly miserable... however, they paid a bit more than the local Gefilte 'n Chips franchise, my OTHER employment option. After getting the job (but before getting a nice dose of soul-crushing), I bounced back home like a methamphetamine-crazed Tigger, yelling, "OH MY GOD, I CAN AFFORD NAME-BRAND RAMEN NOW!" The following eight years brought a marked improvement in my circumstances (and dinner selections).

12. An exercise in writing, randomness and self-reflection (when commenting/posting, only include item "C"):
A. In exactly 25 words, describe the thing you're proudest of.
B. In exactly 25 words, describe the thing you're most ashamed of.
C. Combine the odd-numbered words from A. with the even-numbered words from B.

I’ve is much fine and between but selfishness sense the humor which and on to and well not myself on others right survived of grown.

Project : "Hurty Laundry"

Some people save things. Some people save things compulsively. Me? I'm a discarder. You name it, odds are I've dispatched it to Goodwill or the local landfill. Paper, clothing, rotten nectarines, masonry debris, cassette tapes, several dozen pairs of old-lady underpants (long story), magazines... I'm never so happy as when I'm flinging something into a Hefty bag and out of my life. Perhaps it's my genetic lineage... my ancestors were Jewish and Russian, two groups for whom "fleeing in the dead of night" might as well be an Olympic sport. While I have no reason to believe I'm in danger of being rousted from my futon by nefarious parties... damn it, if it DOES happen, I won't take long to pack.

True story: until recently, I didn't own a can opener. I avoided canned goods when I could. If unable to obtain a desired foodstuff in any other format (cream of coconut, I'm looking at YOUR saturated-fatty ass), I gamely attacked the can with the tiny, military-style opener on the side of my Swiss Army knife.

There are two notable exceptions to my "More Stark(e) than Philippe" policy: the sentimental and the scientific.

While my Crema Tropicale-splattered kitchen tells one story, my shelves tell quite another.

I've got the tiny stuffed giraffe my mother put in my crib before I was born. I've got the London Fog trenchcoat my father wore as a teenager. I've got the loose-leaf notes I kept during the weeks following J.Q.'s birth ("3:00 AM: 3 oz. milk. WHOOOOO! ROCK ON, BABY!"). I've got how-tos, textbooks, MLA citation guides and my own well-thumbed copy of the Merck Manual (which I should really replace with a little laminated card reading "STOP WORRYING. IT IS PROBABLY JUST GAS").

Emotion and information. In a minimalist existence, these two invariably get a free pass.

Nothing illustrates this as well as my crammed-to-bursting Sent Mail folder. It's like an archaeological dig through my heart.

The breakdown of my marriage led to some of my proudest moments, as well as some of my absolute worst. Faithful corespondent that I am, almost all of them were immediately adjectived up and fired off. Collectively, they're like "Jul In Review": a horrible, wonderful, hilarious, agonizing and enlightening synopsis of... well, ME, both with my soon-to-be ex and by myself.

There are dozens of messages that make me cringe. That's why I saved them, I think. If something makes me squirm with embarrassment or shame, it's a good sign that I need to confront it, rather than ditching it by the side of the information superhighway like a rusty muffler.

I'm sharing them because snooping through someone else's e-mail is a blast.

No! (Well, partially.)

I'm sharing them to confront them, and because they're freakishly fascinating. I like the idea of excavating the dark, intimate and seldom-shared and holding it up to the sunlight. Seeing if it will blanch or melt or spontaneously combust... or if I will.

In the words of the prophet, it's all the same, only the names (and identifying details) have been changed. As the soon-to-be ex, the OtherWoman and I still have to consort with one another for a few hours each week (and have managed to do so rather peacefully), please refrain from ripping them respective new ones. What's done is done.

That being said... go ahead... take a peek inside.

Las Vegas, Nevada Is Trying To Kill Us All - Pt. IV

So… um, yeah... I fully intended to finish my Las Vegas travelogue (for those just joining us... Pt I., Pt II, Pt. III). But I am easily distracted, goddamn it, as anyone who's ever eaten out with me can attest ("Oooh, bread! Did you know that most restaurants' 'brown' bread is white bread with caramel coloring added? Huh, who do you suppose invented the foil-wrapped butter pat? Yum, turbinado sugar! Let me now do some fork acrobatics. Whoo, look at 'er spin! Hey, my pierogies are here! This ONE time when I was eating pierogies...", ad nauseum).

So due to my flitty nature, there will not be a rousing, journalistically-brilliant conclusion to the Vegas story. There will, however, be a stupid synopsis, complete with bulleted lists. I may even toss in some napkin origami ("Look! A crane! Oh... uh, sorry. Why don't you just wipe your mouth on the tablecloth?").

Further Events of Note Which Transpired in Sin City

The Wedding : The raison d'etre for the entire sojourn. A coworker of Em's was getting hitched at Caesar's Palace. The ceremony was due to kick off mere hours after Em and I returned from the gun range. While getting gussied up, I was scrupulously careful not to wash my hands. I found the juxtaposition of gunpowder and formalwear to be somewhat roguishly sexy. "Will you be having the stuffed capon Florentine or the herb-rubbed prime rib, Miss Moneypenny?", I murmured in my best Sean Connery brogue, zipping up my dress. Once suitably smokin', Em and I headed over to Caesar's. The bride was gorgeous, the groom was adorable, the chapel was surprisingly non-tacky. The wedding itself was... well, rather painful. For me, at least. The participants both seemed radiantly happy, but this isn't THEIR blog, now is it (http://radiantly - happy- newlyweds- crushing- the- spirits- of- those- whose- own- marriages- have- recently- collapsed.blogspot.com)?

Prior to the whole divorce process, I wasn't easily swayed by our culture's common emotional triggers... death, natural disaster, fuzzy-eared puppies, insurance company commercials. I didn't cry at my own wedding. I didn't cry at J.Q.'s birth.

There was no saline dribbling down my face at the wedding, either. But it is safe to say that I was - as bad lyricists and pop-psych mavens are so fond of saying - Crying On the Inside.

I will never have another first wedding. I will never be so idealistic. I will never be so blindly hopeful.

You only get one chance to jump off of that particular pier with gleeful, fuck-all abandon. If you fall victim to an ill-placed rock or marauding speedboat... well, you'd better believe that your next immersion will be of the jittery, one-toe-at-a-time variety.

I sat there, toying with my miniature bottle of bubbles, averting my eyes from the bride and groom's soul-cauterizing joy. I had never been so acutely aware of that little hollow spot within me; my mind kept returning to it, like a tongue unable to stop prodding a recently-vacated tooth socket.

The happy couple kissed. There was a flurry of bubbles and flashbulbs. Em looked at my face. "Wanna go get some drinks?" she said.

The Strip Search : Em left the following morning. By this point, our normally hardy constitutions had been reduced to Waffle House hash browns: smothered, diced, scattered and fried. Fuck Transylvania - Vegas is without a doubt the most vampiric of locales. "I have no idea how you're going to make it through another two days," said Em, practically French-kissing her boarding pass in gratitude, "I feel like I've been here for two YEARS." "I know," I said, lying in bed with my eyes closed, "I'm thinking of hopping on a Greyhound bus to L.A. Or Death Valley. Anywhere but here. This town is killing me."

I was too drained, however, to successfully mount an escape attempt. Instead, I opted for immersion therapy. In a singularly Cheever-ish move, I walked the entire length of the strip, traveling from casino to casino. I have this to say about that:

• Steve Wynn is a genius. If he keeps cranking out consistently-gorgeous masterpieces of modern industrial design, he can rip through a DOZEN Picassos, take a whiz in the Sistine Chapel and paint a Hitler moustache on the Mona Lisa. His chosen field may be vulgar and commercial, but the guy is gooooood at what he does.


• Don't bother with the Bellagio's cute little pastry shop. Grainy gelato, lackluster crepes. C'est merde!


• Do stop by Vosges-Haut Chocolat at the Venetian. The truffles with Taleggio cheese are transcendentally good. Yet again, I’m a sucker for unusual candy. Pour some melted chocolate over a box of roofing nails, drizzle it in caramel and sprinkle it with pulverized Alaskan lichens, and you’d better believe I’ll pay $17.50 a pound for it.


• Even though I have no desire to see scantily-clad ectomorphs twisting themselves into knots, unless they are doing so in translucent heels while clutching a pole... I must admit that the Cirque du Soleil gift shops have some pretty awesome swag. C'est bonne!


• The Fashion Show Mall: visiting a mall while on vacation has always struck me as vaguely awful... how many cultural differences can one encounter at Bath & Body Works ("Wow, they sure like freesia here in Pyonyang... it's like a whole different WORLD!")? However, the cool, capitalistic confines of the mall are the perfect antidote for the non-stop stimulation of the Strip. In ye olden days, warriors would fortify themselves for battle with flagon of ale and a nice meaty haunch. Today, we can do the same with an Orange Julius and a hot dog on a stick.


• Heee-larious tourist game: "Drunk… Or Just German?"

After monorailing it back to my hotel (and determining that my fellow passengers were, in fact, of the Teutonic persuasion), I felt chipper/stupid enough to embark upon a new adventure...

Terror at 1,150 Feet : For the latter half of my trip, I stayed at the Stratosphere, the Strip's northernmost casino-tel. The joint's claim to fame is the big ol' concrete phallus known as the Stratosphere Tower. One would be tempted to call it a low-rent Space Needle… however, the thing’s literally twice as tall as its Seattle-based bro. It is topped by a glass-walled flying saucer which contains thrill rides, a revolving restaurant, the world's highest Starbucks... a busy little mish-mash of American culture. It is fitting, then, that my tower excursion was a Betty Boop/Lucille Ball/Anna Nicole Smith-style triumph of ditziness. I somehow managed to:

• Decide to visit the tower.
• Purchase a ticket for the tower.
• Wait in line to ascend the tower and
• Take an ear-popping elevator ride to the top of the tower, without ONCE remembering that
• I’m afraid of heights.

Whoops.

After exiting the elevator, one is deposited in doughnut-shaped room. The "hole" of the doughnut contains a gift shop and concession stands; in lieu of chocolate glaze, the doughnut's exterior surface is floor-to-ceiling safety glass. I exited the elevator, strode merrily over to the glass... and promptly sank to my knees. I was sorely tempted to lie down (maximizing body-to-carpet contact and minimizing my chances of FALLING ALL THE WAY DOWN THERE OH GOD NOOOOOOO). After five minutes of wide-eyed terror, I stood up. "Okay, Jul," I told myself, "time to take it like a man: with alcohol!" A tiny bottle of hooch was purchased at the World's Highest Gift Shop. A cup of ice was obtained from the World's Highest Starbucks. I retreated to one of the park benches lining the outer perimeter of the room and spent a happy half hour staring at a strip club's blazing neon sign and sipping Gentleman Jack. It was very Jethro Tull. "Well, shit," thought I, chewing on an ice cube, "Might as well take advantage of my chemically-steadied nerves. Thrill ride time!"

Jul's Handy-Dandy Tourist Tip #83:

If you're going to summon up all your courage and go on one of the World's Highest Thrill rides, don't ride in the last car. It will reduce what should be "courageous confrontation of one's fears" to something more akin to "sitting on top of a Speed Queen during spin cycle".

Jul's Handy-Dandy Tourist Tip #84:

Sometimes, when you need a "vacation from your vacation" because you're "about ready to fucking die", it's helpful to stage an Evening of Suburban Sloth in your own hotel room.

You will need:

• One (1) bottle sparkling wine. Ideally Pepto-Bismol pink in color, sweet enough to attract ants from neighboring counties and under $5 a bottle.

• One (1) Styrofoam take-out container full of greasy Mexican food... sour cream, pico de gallo, mountains of Mexi-cheese, plus a protein-stuffed starch of some kind. Starch should preferably be fried; protein may be fatty chicken, deep-fried fish or Beef Which Is Strangely Unlike Any Beef You've Ever Had Before, But You Suspect It Is Wise Not to Ask Questions.

• Three (3) or more (4?) episodes Law & Order, variety unimportant. Classic L&I is superb (and fun to handicap... "Huh, Chris Sarandon is in the opening credits. Insanity plea!"). SVU features Ice-T, as well as Namby-Pamby Sensitive Detective, always right on the verge of popping a forehead vein over a penguin bestiality ring or some such depravity du jour. And Criminal Intent, of course, has Vincent D'Onofrio... weird, mumbly and ooooh, lordy, hot as the surface of the sun. I’d confess to just about ANYTHING, just to bask in his twitchy presence for a few moments more.

What Would a Trip to Vegas Be Without Public Indecency? : A number of Vegas hotels have recently begun offering "European-style sunbathing". I was unaware that a town which offers topless shows, topless bars and topless mud wrestling was suffering from such a boob deficit, but there you have it.

In an uncharacteristically "hep" move, the Stratosphere had recently hopped on the public-nudity bandwagon. Their Naked Pool was advertised via a series of posters featuring fuzz-core photos and the promise of a “secluded, adults-only oasis".

After giving birth in a teaching hospital and crashing a swinger’s convention, I officially have no shame. Thus, the morning of my last day in Vegas, I grabbed my towel, my copy of “Fear & Loathing” and my courage and headed over to the Naked Pool. I navigated a maze of hallways, ascended a dim staircase and flung open a set of fire doors. Stepping out onto the roof, I surveyed the scene.

It was kind of hilarious. It looked like the set of MTV’s Totally Exploitative Summer Blast, circa 1993.

Sheets of beach grass were stapled to every vertical surface. The pool was flanked by frighteningly ugly fiberglass palm trees. Four individuals occupied the “oasis”.

There were three Aryan frat boys, reclining on lounge chairs, letting the sun crisp their bulging pecs.

And then there was The Goddess.

She straddled a pool float, giggling and flirting with the appreciative Tri-Delts. She didn’t appear to be made of flesh, but rather melted and injection-molded Barbies. Every inch of her body was taut, bronze and on magnificent display. Her bare breasts and thong-clad ass were as perfectly globular (and, one suspected, unyielding) as the fiberglass coconuts looming overhead. I scurried under the “Melanoma-Obsessed Dorkwad” canopy, eyes trained on her the entire time.

I spent close to an hour curled up on my shady chaise, reading “F&L” and sneaking furtive glances at The Goddess. She didn’t do much… bobbed around on her float, exited the pool to place a few cell phone calls (while lying on her stomach… perhaps her gleaming ass functioned as something of an impromptu antenna?)

Finally, I could stand it no longer.

“Goddamn it… I may be pale and squishy, but I wanna go for a swim!” I said, yanking my dress over my head . I flung my bra over the back of the chaise and strode, bikini bottom-clad, into the sunlight. The Goddess and her harem gave me a cursory glance, then returned to their conversation. I shimmied down an aluminum ladder and slipped into the pool’s chlorinated coolness. For the next forty-five minutes, I swam laps… doggy-paddle, backstroke and - uh-huh - breaststroke. I floated on my back and stared at the pale desert sky. Semi-nude swimming was indeed delightful. “Damn, maybe I’ll try this the next time I’m at the Holiday Inn,” I thought. Once pleasantly exhausted, I climbed out and sashayed over to my chair. After toweling my hair and sheathing my nakedness, I headed downstairs and treated myself to some breakfast. You can keep your butter, your jelly, your twee little jars of double Devon cream. Nothing makes toast taste better than cheerful brazenness.

And that, my lovelies, was Las Vegas. There was, of course, the journey home, which featured jellybeans, “In Cold Blood”, a barbecue-scented layover in Memphis and the enthralling experience of riding next to a prisoner being extradited (“Don’t worry, I didn’t kill no one,” said my seatmate by way of introduction. I wonder if one can REQUEST prisoner seating, like the Kosher meal?). There was the unsuccessful attempt to secure a gypsy cab for the ride home (The Soon-To-Be-Ex Mr. Thumbscrews advised me to “look for the guys wearing pimp hats”). There was the joyous reunion with J.Q. (who chanted “Mama!” for a solid 15 minutes). And then there was the solemn vow that my next vacation would absolutely, positively be in a more relaxing locale. I’ve heard Pamplona is lovely in July…

Project : "All This And Nothing"

I found it while poking around a college bookstore. I knew it was what I'd been searching for.

It was a tiny book of blank flashcards, each no bigger than a Post-It, bound together with a single metal ring.

I bought a luscious 36-shade set of colored pencils and spent the next few weeks filling the cards with cartoon depictions of special memories my husband and I shared.

It's the most romantic thing I've ever done.

It's one of a million things - memories, hopes, goals, secrets, appliances-sandwiches-TV-shows - which I'll now and forever view through the tinted lens of the marriage's messy collapse.

A marriage viewed from behind an impending divorce seems oddly homogenous. The happy times - and I know there were many - don't seem terribly joyous. The painful times seem more pathetically prophetic than sad. The book of your life is re-writ in an alien script with unfamiliar curliques and sentence structures.

Without further ado - but with fair warning that this bitch takes FOREVER to load, so be patient both at first and between clicks -
"All This And Nothing".

Las Vegas, Nevada Is Trying to Kill Us All - Pt. III

V : Foie Gras…

"I think," I informed Em, weaving my way into our hotel room and collapsing in a small, whisky-scented puddle, "I may need to eat... some actual... you know, food. Which is not Scotch." "Dude, what was the last thing you ate?" asked Em. "Erm... a bagel. In Philadelphia. Eight hours ago," I admitted, peeling myself off the bed, "I think deriving one's calories exclusively from booze and cream cheese may be one of those 'warning signs'. C'mon... let's go get some grub." After pulling on dresses which displayed more cleavage than a geologist's convention, we headed out the door. The plunging necklines were entirely appropriate... as it turned out, we had a hot date with culinary destiny.

Normal people develop crushes on movie stars, musicians, athletes... the attractive, talented and high-profile. Being something of a freak, it takes more than a killer jump shot or glacially blue eyes to make me melt (although if Gael Garcia Bernal were to stop by one evening, you'd better believe I'd be cooking him veggie bacon in the nude ten to twelve hours hence). Nay, I go all gooey for authors, economists, particle physicists. And, of course, those brave souls who spend sixteen hours a day elbow-deep in giblets, being harangued by cruel overlords in silly hats: chefs.

I fell for Thomas Keller after he was profiled in Michael Ruhlman's wonderful "Soul of a Chef". As portrayed by Ruhlman, "the best chef in America" was something of an anomaly: hugely talented, hugely dedicated, yet somehow free of the huge ego which is so often part and parcel of genius. Keller's "French Laundry Cookbook" implanted in my heart further lardons of admiration. While visiting San Francisco several years earlier, I'd called The French Laundry each morning, pleading and wheedling for a reservation. "Please, pleaaaase," I whined, "I'm pregnant and the baby really, really needs a twelve-course degustation menu!" Despite my efforts, the fetal J.Q. was cruelly denied ahi tartare (perhaps this is why he currently refuses all foodstuffs not suffixed with "... and cheese"). When I discovered that T-Kell had joined the ranks of uber-chefs opening Vegas eateries, I resolved to finally worship at his truffle-strewn altar.

Getting to the French Laundry is a lengthy (if bucolic) pain in the ass. This makes it all the more disheartening to spend your time in Yountville sitting on the hood of your rental Taurus, gazing pathetically at that cozy little building. Getting to Bouchon (Keller's Vegas outpost) is a comparative breeze. After a stroll through the Venetian's Italia-luxe lobby, you board a brass-heavy elevator, press "10" and - le voila! - you are catapulted to the south of France. Well, after a brief tussle with the reservation-bots, that is.

"Please, pleaaaase," I whined, by now practiced in the fine art of hostess-wheedling. "Thomas Keller is like a GOD to me! And we'll buy appetizers and desserts, promise." "Sorry," said the hostess, "We're really booked tonight." "Say!" I said in a moment of inspiration, "Can we eat at the bar?" This tactic had previously resulted in an aspic-flinging good time at Philadelphia's finest Frog eatery; it was also a rousing success at Bouchon. "Oh my god oh my god oh my god," I chanted, mounting a stool, "It's actually happening!" "I thought you said he had no hand in the day-to-day operation of this place?" said Em, giving me a pitying glance. "Well, this is technically true," I admitted, worshipfully stroking a Bouchon cocktail napkin, "But it still has, like, the essence of Keller. Um, not in a gross way."

The bread basket - so often an afterthought - set the tone for the entire meal. Fresh, crusty bread, sweet butter in a tiny ramekin, a small dish of warm pistachios. Homey, uncomplicated and delicious. This simplicity extended across the entire menu - there was no grandstanding, no gratuitous use of foam and micro-greens. Freed from the constraints of culinary pretension, the raw ingredients were able to shine.

The charcuterie platter brought further crusty bread, thinly-sliced hard sausage, grainy mustard and snappily acidic little pickles. The Provencal huntsman's Lunchable, as it were. Em's braised short ribs were a rich, Bordeaux-scented tangle of tender meat (note: I believe restaurant reviewers are contractually obligated to use each of those adjectives when describing short ribs). My lamb, however, was sex on a plate. "You can have more short ribs if you like," said Em, eyeing my entree. "Back off, bitch!" I said, waving my fork menacingly. Balanced atop a tasty summit of piquillo-laced couscous, this was more than just an entree. It was the Platonic Ideal of lamb. "It's... so... good," I whispered, dividing the last medallion into tiny, flavor-maximizing bites. "Oh, just eat it," sighed Em. "Hey, I can't help it if your entree was merely excellent, rather than an orgiastic explosion of flavor," I said. Or rather, I would have, had I not been busy licking lamb molecules off my fork.

Once my sparkling-clean plate had been removed by our waiter, Em and I indulged in dessert. Our sweets arrived with a complimentary plate of little pastries, the meal's only off note. "I think this is supposed to be coconut?" said a suspicious Em. They were beautiful, tiny and utterly bland - the celebutantes of the confectionary world. Our actual desserts, however, more than made up for their wee inadequacy. "Oh, god," said Em, plunging a spoon into her creme caramel, "This is so, so, so good." "So good. Very, very, very good," I concurred, trying to resist the urge to pick up a drink stirrer and directly snort my pistachio pot de creme. Once fully engorged with sugar and heavy cream, we settled our tab (did you know that well drinks are $12.50 at Bouchon? Neither did we!) and staggered outside. "Wanna go... you know... do something?" said Em. "I know it makes me a total wuss," I sighed, "But I'm freaking exhausted." This was the first ominous utterance of what would become our mantra. "Yeah, me too," said Em. "Why don't we go back to out hotel and crash?" I suggested, "After all, we've got a busy, firearm-filled day ahead of us."

---

VI: … and Firepower

After sleeping the sleep of the just, Em and I ate the breakfast of the just (featuring the prosciutto of righteousness) and set out for The Gun Store. "Yeah, we're open every day," an employee yelled over the din when I called, "Just tell your cabby to take you to the place where you can shoot machine guns!" This is The Gun Store's main draw - the opportunity to wield ridiculous, heavy-duty, compensating-for-SOMETHING weaponry. AK-47s, M16s... you name it. Of course, that seductive new assault rifle will require ammunition. Therein lies the genuis of The Gun Store. As you might surmise, fully-automatic weapons eat up ammo very, very quickly. In "burst" mode (and of course you're going to want to try "burst" mode), an M16 fires three rounds per second. Gun rentals generally include anywhere from 25 - 50 rounds. Short of stuffing it in a g-string or setting it directly ablaze, there's no faster way to burn through cash.

Em and I merely wished to brush up on our handgun markswomanship. Walking into the harshly-lit, wood paneled store, it was obvious that we were in the minority. The testosterone was almost palpably thick. Excited young men were pressed up against every inch of available counter space. Their decades-long Rambo fantasies were mere minutes from being fulfilled. There were signs on the wall indicating that the Gatling guns and shoulder-mounted grenade launchers were "FOR DISPLAY PURPOSES ONLY". Scarily enough, I believe those signs were absolutely necessary.

Like everything else in Vegas, The Gun Store is run like a well-oiled machine (in this case, gun oil). You get in line, you spend about five minutes admiring the 8" saw-toothed hunting knives in the glass cases before you. Then, a burly guy wearing a holster large enough to double as an overnight bag steps up and booms, "So, what will you be shooting today?" Most patrons already have a vivid mental image of their weapon of choice. "M16! M16!" they say, nearly shaking themselves apart with excitement and cinematic bloodlust. Those choosing to fire automatic weapons are handed a box of bullets; those who'll be using handguns are given both ammo and an unloaded gun - a practice which gave Em and I a serious case of the jibblies.

"Er... these people probably haven’t taken any nationally-certified firearm safety classes, right?" I asked, surveying the crowd and making sure my .357 semi-auto was pointed towards the floor at all times. "I really doubt it," said Em, nervously fondling her revolver.

We made our way through the line, paid up and were directed towards the range. We (and our respective pieces) strolled over, donned earmuffs and goggles and waited our turn. Every few minutes, the blue metal door would burst open, discharging a Gun Store employee yelling, "Got a HOT GUN here! Let's MOVE ASIDE!"... as well as one or more dazed young men. Within several minutes, a smiling, crew-cut gentleman led Em and I to the range. His schpiel took all of two minutes. "HERE IS HOW YOU LOAD THE WEAPON. HERE IS HOW YOU DISENGAGE THE WEAPON’S SAFETY. HERE IS HOW YOU AIM, AND HERE IS HOW YOU FIRE. REMEMBER, LADIES, WEAPONS POINTED DOWNRANGE AT ALL TIMES. ENJOY!"

Em and I entered adjacent stalls and proceeded to spend a satisfying half-hour discharging .357 rounds into hapless paper targets. Em had chosen "Ambiguously Menacing Gentleman"; I had chosen the least-humanoid target, a person-shaped blue blob. "Oooh, that must've stung, Blobby," I said, unloading my last round. We were relived of our weapons, handed our tattered targets and ushered out the door. Standing in the lobby, wiping the sweat from our brows, I turned to Em and said, "DUDE! The Gun Store employees have gotta get laid ALL THE TIME." This was followed by a brief burst of laughter from behind the counter, and your narrator flushing and jumping behind a speed-loader display.

"Sooo... want to go get some brunch?" said Em, brushing back her hair (Em has long, lustrous, naturally curly hair. On more than one occasion, I've been tempted to stick a wad of Bubble Yum in it. You know, just because).

"Not yet," I said, "There's one more thing I've got to do."

I got back in line. When my own personal Nugent stepped up and asked, "So, what will you be shooting today?", I pointed. "Shotgun." "Do you want the short-barrel, 'Miami Vice' model?" rumbled the clerk, "Has a lot less kick." "Actually," I admitted, "I'm doing this as a tribute to Hunter S. Thompson. So I'd like the biggest one you've GOT." More employee laughter, another box of bullets slid across the counter. I was quickly led back to the range, implored to, "… really BRACE that sucker against your shoulder," and handed a truly spectacular pump-action weapon. My five recoil-licious rounds were spent within five minutes (making shotgun rental as pricey, minute for minute, as a mid-grade call girl). It was abundantly worth it. A week later, I was still fondly rubbing the faint, bra-strap shaped bruise on my shoulder.

Stepping out into the lobby, I pulled off my goggles and whispered, "Hunter, that was for you, buddy. It's four more rounds than you got."

Em and I walked out into the bright sunlight and boarded a Strip-bound bus.

"I am so motherfucking exhausted," I said.

"Tell me about it," said Em.

"I think this place is, like, actively sucking the life out of me. The stimulation, it's just... nonstop."
“Yuh-huh,” said Em, resting her head against the seat.

We sat, quietly reflecting and clutching our rolled-up paper targets.

"Dude," I whispered, "Everyone knows what we were doing today. Either that or they figure we were attending an architect's convention that got a little out of hand."

We disembarked mid-Strip and ambled towards the fabulously depressing Riviera. It was time to scrub off, gussy up and venture forth into something more dangerous than a frat boy with an Uzi.

A wedding.

---

To Be Continued...

Las Vegas, Nevada Is Trying To Kill Us All - Pt. II

III: Lady Liberty, Come Out and Play With Me

An unexpected damp spot on the vast, rumpled sheet of the Mojave, "The Meadows" has attracted Spanish traders, Mormon settlers, the Union-Pacific Railway and, most recently, the mighty forces of capitalist decadence. Flying in, the rough plain of sand and ochre seems endless. Then, inevitably, the mark of man - those unnaturally precise lines gouged by a clever boy with a bigger knife than he ought. They're initially sparse - bright, harsh little burgs which will ruin your Chevy and mutate your melanin. The lines grow closer - suburbs, of course. The Real Deal is probably awful, possibly beautiful. It's a mad scribble on graph paper, a tiny gush of neon in the middle of a wasteland. Touching down, even the nauseated and miserable experience a sort of grudging awe.

The Hoover Dam, the Empire State Building, the Golden Gate Bridge - our nation's most impressive structures tend to be utilitarian. Vegas, however, is that rare and wonderful place where enormous quantities of money and effort are expended for no noble purpose whatsoever. It's grandiosity because we can, or because that’s what sells. It is, in a way, a purer vision of America than any of our more useful toys would indicate.

If Vegas by plane inspires wonder and reflection, Vegas by foot inspires low-level panic. The noise, lights and jangling begin the second you step off the plane. If you had a good arm, you could probably toss quarters towards a slot machine from the jetway itself. At the time of my visit, the wall immediately above the baggage-claim escalators featured an enormous close-up photo of Celine Dion’s head. Queasy and cranky, my first thought was not “My, I would certainly love to see international best-selling recording artist Celine Dion perform at Caesar’s Palace”, but “Aaaagh! That thing eats its young!” I scurried over to the carousel, snagged my suitcase and boarded a Strip-bound shuttle bus. I was entering the belly of the beast (no, not Celine).

After my suitcase and I were dumped in front of our hotel, I realized that we were in a bit of a bind. The room reservation was in Em’s name, and she wouldn’t be arriving for another three hours. “Well, dang,” said I, “Looks like it’s just you and me, ol’ 2” Bigger Than Standard Overhead Compartment” (his rap name is “Biggie O.C.”). “We’ve been in Vegas for two whole hours. Isn’t it time we had a drink? Signify your consent by doing absolutely nothing.” With Biggie O.C.’s wholehearted approval, we strolled down the block towards our first “F&L”-related task: getting sloshed at the Circus Circus.

The Circus Circus was Vegas’ first “family-oriented” casino. At the time it was terrifying an ether-addled Thompson, it was a fairly recent addition to the Strip. The passage of thirty years and the addition of an indoor amusement park (replete with log flume) have not dulled its sinister, clown-heavy ambiance. The upstairs midway is still chaotic; it’s possible to fling a bean bag at a milk bottle while sipping a 40-oz. daiquiri and watching a silver Lycra-swathed acrobat balance atop a 20’ pole. Descend into the bowels of the casino and there’s chaos of a different sort. The dingy little bar offers a modicum of peace and a good view of the action, perfect for amateur sociologists and professional drinkers. “Hey, are you over 21?” said the barkeep when I ordered my drink. “Yeah,” I said. “Oh, okay,” he replied, handing me a Scotch and soda. This town, I admitted, pulling out my notebook, certainly has its charms.

---

IV: Like Bukowski, But Nicer and With Better Boobs

Writing at a bar is either incredibly pretentious or a tribute to a fine literary tradition. Kerouac knocking back Thunderbird… Hemingway sipping a mojito in Key West… Lord Byron holding back Jane Austen’s hair as she demurely hurls into a Dumpster - well, maybe not. I can only hope it’s the latter. I spent a good deal of my Vegas excursion perched on a stool, scribbling away in the Official Amateur Writer Notebook and chewing on a drink stirrer. In writing - much like in sex - alcohol doesn’t spur one to new heights of greatness. Rather, it’s Vaseline for the conscious mind, relieving the awkwardness and chafing, hastening the arrival of the fun part. By the time Em called to let me know she was at our hotel, I’d cranked out fifteen entertaining but disjointed (and in some cases, moist) loose-leaf pages.

Notes From Underground The Circus Circus Hotel and Casino

• “Deal or No Deal” slot machines: cultural ephemera devoured, digested, excreted in a brighter and louder form before the original product has even hit syndication
  
  
• This entire operation pumping so furiously hard that you can’t help but imagine an era in which it all shudders to a halt and slowly erodes. The Wynn, that brand-new, massive sheet of copper foil, tarnished and punctured. Massive polygons devoured by choking greenery. Silica, steel, concrete reduced to from whence it came… just a little bit more blocky and stylized.
  
  
• The Strip, fantasy: a deliriously cramped, walkable Gomorrah. Here’s a life-sized pyramid! Here’s a medieval castle! There’s a ten-story, neon-bedecked replica of Donald Trump’s hair! The Strip, reality: it’s the suburbs. Only with slots and whores.
  
  
• NASCAR shirts, Bud Lite and ever-elusive gratification.
  
  
• I appear to be the only person in Vegas actually paying for my own drinks. The question of the day – are you playing? Pouring quarters into slots? Frantically jabbing a video poker screen? Attempting to knock over a tower of milk bottles with a bean bag? Well, then, sir… may we get you anything? Watery drink? Deep-fried snack? Fellatio? Oh, no need to move… keep on pulling that level. Syndee will be by shortly to take care of your OTHER lever, ha ha ha. It’s no trouble, no trouble at all. This establishment always likes to show our appreciation for loyal masters of the bean bag such as yourself.
  
  
• Seven-freaking-fifty for a watery-ass Manhattan? Made with, like, Ol’ Granpappy’s Caramel-Colored, Whisky-Flavored Grain Neutral Spirits? FOR SHAME, referee-attired bartender!
  
  
• I am not playing. Of all the adult activities I’ve tried – excessive drinking, drugs of varying degrees of legality, fooling around with the entire Philadelphia metropolitan area – wouldn’t you know, good ol’ legalized gambling is the only one which held no allure. And it’s not like I haven’t TRIED. There’s not a potentially addictive behavior I haven’t rubbed up against like a starving housecat.
  
  
• It’s okay. It comes with the job. If Van Gogh can suffer and die in the name of his art, surely I can plunk down seven-fifty a glass for mine.
  
  
• Whoa. Maybe these drinks aren’t so watery after all.

---

To Be Continued...

Las Vegas, Nevada Is Trying To Kill Us All - Pt. I

Prelude: Gimme a Scotch and Dramamine

I was somewhere around Nevada in the middle of the desert when the airsickness began to take hold.

"Oh, nooo…", I groaned, pressing my head against the cool glass oval of the window. Despite having nerves (and an esophageal sphincter) of steel, I don't fly well. My mind is untroubled by the prospect of hurtling through the stratosphere in a pressurized tin can. My body, however, is violently opposed to the whole idea. Commercial air travel makes me feel like I've been flung across the room by someone with large and ungentle hands. The landing - usually endured with eyes, teeth and barf bag clenched - is that final, sickening smack as I tumble into a coffee table, a wall, Detroit.

"Ugh," I said, staggering into McCarran International Airport, "I need a drink."

As it so happened, I was in the right place.

---

I: Dr. Gonzo vs. DARE Graduates

In 1971, Hunter S. Thompson and Oscar Acosta traveled to Las Vegas, ostensibly for Thompson to cover the Mint 400 motorcycle race for Sports Illustrated. A somewhat-fictionalized account of this trip - manic, drug-fueled, and vomit-splattered - became "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas". Let there be no doubt: Thompson possessed some formidable journalistic chops. However, from "F&L" forward, his public persona wasn’t that of "author" so much as "professional batshit-crazy individual". The Hunter of counterculture mythology comes off as a funnier, more depraved Hemingway, banging away on a Selectric while armed to the teeth and coked to the gills. This legacy makes "F&L" something of a guilty pleasure. It's a taste one suspects might best be kept private, like a love of "Chic" magazine or an appreciation for "Catcher in the Rye" which persists past age sixteen.

Well, to hell with that.

Foie gras and oily pizza are both delicious. Despite "knowing better", I proudly maintain my affectatious middle-class penchant for the seedy. I read classics and dry Booker Prize winners with the same grim resolve that I eat sugar-free bran muffins. For fun, I slip into something a bit more subversive. What can I say? I've got a thing for cheap Scotch, boys who don’t call back and authors with an utter disregard for safety, civility and “Elements of Style”.

Thompson called “Fear and Loathing” a “failed experiment in gonzo journalism”. My own Vegas sojourn, then, could be described as a failed pastiche to a failed experiment in gonzo journalism. I’m singularly unsuited for reckless rabble-rousing. I’m a mother, an introvert and - most importantly - a child of the 80’s. AIDS, computers and institutionalized irony have always existed. My generation was relentlessly warned that experimenting with sex and drugs would not only kill us, horribly, but deeply disappoint Nancy Reagan. Before setting foot in Vegas, I knew I’d be incapable of recreating the crazed zeal of Thompson’s novel. However, I vowed that the entire trip would be a ridiculous, goofy paean to the book.

“Say, do you mind if I throw a grapefruit in the shower with you?” I asked my friend Em, my Sin City partner-in-crime.

“Why the hell would you do that?”

“Er… no reason.”

No grapefruits were employed as projectiles. I did not ride bumper cars while staggeringly drunk, seduce the entire staff of the hotel’s concierge desk or get kicked out of the Guggenheim-Hermitage Museum’s Robert Mapplethorpe exhibit for yelling, “Good god, has anyone told the NEA about this filth?” In that respect, my trip was a failure.

Actually, it was a failure in every other respect, too. Las Vegas kicked my goddamned ass. But, as failures tend to be, it was at least entertaining.

---

II: Sugary Expectorations, Pals Traversing the Nation

Em and I met when we were fourteen. My earliest memory of that era involves us leaning out of one of our junior high's second-story windows, sucking on jawbreakers and launching vividly-hued gobs of spit on the asphalt below. Charming lasses, we. She and I had quickly forged one of those moody, intense friendships only possible between similarly-alienated teenage girls. It was sort of like "Heavenly Creatures", only without the cold-blooded matricide. As we grew older, our paths diverged and our platonic fervor cooled. Nonetheless, we kept in touch, reuniting every so often for lamb nargisi and wise-assery at the same Indian restaurant we'd been frequenting since our virginal youth (which is to say, a looooong time ago).

She and I took our first trip together when we were fifteen. To call the Ecology Club Whale Watch of '96 a fiasco would be charitable. When we weren't vomiting over the railing of the SS Pollywog, we were flinging dead sand crabs at one another and waging World War III over our shared collection of Nirvana cassettes. Although we quickly shed all ill will and crab appendages, a decade passed before either of us proposed another outing. "A friend of mine is getting married in Vegas," e-mailed Em several months ago, more concise and impulsive than I’ll ever be, "Come with me! It'll be awesome!"

I'm not a spontaneous individual. I do extensive research before purchasing, say, plastic bags (and now know that Ziploc's "sliders" are the bag-fastening device of the beast). Yet within half an hour, I'd shot back an enthusiastic affirmative. "Damn," said the logical center of my brain, reeling, "You win this round, but if you think this means you can start buying lesser-quality food storage products, you've got another thing coming."

I desperately needed a vacation. Twenty-aught-six had been the most tumultuous year of my life. Working, caring for a toddler, moving, dismantling a marriage, selling a home… they’d reduced me to a feebly-twitching raw nerve. A need for escape. A serendipitous invitation. Appealingly sordid visions of “Jul and Em In Las Vegas”. Before I was fully aware of what I was doing, I’d already booked my flight.

---

To Be Continued...

Psycho Killer - Pt. II

(For the first part of "How Our Intrepid Heroine Came To Live With a Self-Proclaimed Serial Killer, see Part I.)

I know what you're thinking. "My parents never would’ve let me move across the country to live with a man I'd just met! Online! Who claimed to have killed people!"

Guess what? My parents wouldn't have, either.

Their path to parenthood was long and hard-won. Your illustrious narrator, their first, arrived only after a decade of marriage, several years of fruitless "trying" and a few miracles of modern medicine. Although my sisters were born in rapid succession, my parents never lost their sense of awe and gratitude. As a result, they were deeply loving but also quite protective.

We watched PBS.

We drank 100% juice.

We didn't bike too far from home.

And we certainly didn't move to Georgia to cohabitate with self-proclaimed psychopaths.

---

Unfortunately for my parents (and their best intentions), I was an astonishingly willful child. From earliest toddlerhood, I ripped through life with white-knuckled determinism. Teenage narcissism intensified this trait; love-bordering-on-religious-fanaticism exploded it. Seventeen Year-Old Jul was not "challenging" or "difficult". Seventeen Year-Old Jul was a Category-5 hurricane: one did not attempt to control it or contain it so much as survive it.

My parents were painfully aware of how any attempts to divert my southbound trajectory would end. Using brute force would be tantamount to hugging an eel. The harder their embrace, the more likely I would be to squirm free, decamp to the nearest Greyhound station and vanish in a cloud of exhaust. Unwilling to risk losing all ties with their child, they were forced to assume the unenviable role of prisoners currying favor with their captor. The overall situation was wretched and unalterable. Via grudging cooperation, they hoped to maintain a small sliver of influence in their daughter’s life.

Of course, they were entirely unaware of David's scary little secret. Had they known, I have no doubt they would've liquidated their assets, hired a squad of deprogrammers and developed a sudden, uncharacteristic faith in an interventionist god.

---

In early January, with my parents' grudging consent, David traveled to Philadelphia to claim his intended bride. I still remember my first glimpse of him as he ascended the stairs at 30th Street Station. He was lithe and blonde, with bright, penetrating eyes… a cherub grown up and grown dark. We locked eyes, lit up, collided in a fervent embrace. I half-expected the entire cavernous structure to disintegrate around our shoulders, shaken apart to marble-dust and cigarette butts.

For years, I couldn't walk past that building without my breath catching and my eyes watering. The next time I form an intense, architecture-linked memory, I'll make damned sure it's with a yurt in Tibet.

We spent the car ride back to my parents' house gently entwining our fingers, staring at one another before grinning and looking away.

We spent that afternoon clumsily rolling around on my futon, marinating in cigarette smoke and sweat. It was here, less than eight hours after we'd met, that the first tiny chink appeared in a previously armor-clad illusion of love.

"Um, baby?” he said, running his fingers over my bare back, "Do you think that next time, you could maybe TRY to keep the same rhythm as me?"

Tears welled up in my eyes. The first seeds of what would become a veritable bumper crop of self-loathing began to sprout in my head. I'd disappointed my soulmate. I was a lousy lay. I wasn't worthy. "Uh... yeah. I'm sorry," I stammered, "I just haven't... y'know... done this a whole lot."

I'd done it so little, in fact, that I was still keeping a mental tally.

It was my ninth time.

If I'd known that the next three months of my life would make that unpleasant little exchange look like "She Walks in Beauty", would I have still gone? You know, I believe I would've. A flotilla of seizure-inducing warning signs wouldn't have altered my course. As is typical of the cocksure, the love-drunk, the inexperienced, I walked in idiocy.

---

Three days, eight hundred miles and a few dozen uppercuts to my self-worth later, we arrived Home: David's parents' finished basement. While I'd been aware that he still lived at home ("keeps the overhead low", he'd explained inscrutably), my first glimpse of the 15'x25' room where my beloved hung his hat was rather disheartening. It was a dim, low-ceilinged cell with Taco Bell wrappers and Dungeons & Dragons paraphernalia scattered over every free surface. The cheeriest touch was the scuffed checkerboard linoleum. "This?” I thought, as that first tiny chink began to grow, "THIS is where all the amoral adventures and shadowy plans for world domination take place? This glorified dorm room is where David the Mastermind spends his time?"

It certainly was. It was where I'd be spending 99% of mine, too.

---

Many women's first few weeks of motherhood are characterized by unimaginable exhaustion, slow-motion panic and a profound sense of isolation. There ceases to be any appreciable difference between 1:00 AM and 1:00 PM. The blinds stay perpetually drawn. A sharp delineation appears between Out There and In Here. The latter arena is so all-consuming - life measured in twenty-minute naps, number of diapers wet and dirtied, frantic calls to the pediatrician - that Out There might as well cease to exist.

I've been there. I've sobbed into a passport-sized diaper. I've lost twenty pounds in under a month because my sudden, graduate-level crash-course in Keeping Infant Alive simply didn't allow for meal breaks.

Georgia was worse.

David worked from home (read: did ten minutes' worth of maintenance on his father's website each month). As a result, he was able to set his own schedule. Ever the iconoclast, he chose the Circadian-altering, crazy-making third shift. We rose mid-afternoon and spent all night concocting impassioned plans to conquer the world, the e-commerce sector or the mall frogurt-stand clerk who skimped on toppings. While unskilled in almost every other area, David was phenomenally charismatic, Anton LaVey crossed with Tony Robbins. It was this slick, sinister enthusiasm which held everything together. Of course our midnight machinations were nothing more than a house of cards. Under dim incandescents, though, the illusion was just too dazzling to doubt.

In addition to being nocturnal, my betrothed was also something of an agoraphobic. Well, that's not strictly true. There were the bimonthly cigarette-replenishment trips, occasional forays to Waffle House for coffee and waitress-derision. There was one action-packed trip to Middle of Fucking Nowhere, Georgia which featured extensive firearm practice, Skoal-sampling and my first tattoo (a malformed mass of squiggles, applied by a burly gent who drank a Bud and told homophobic jokes the entire time). The majority of the time, however, David preferred to stay tucked away in our wood-paneled oubliette, orchestrating mayhem... or, as was more often the case, playing "Metal Gear: Solid" for 48 hours in a row.

"When did he find time to systematically slay thirteen Atlanta-area individuals?” I'd briefly ponder before chastising myself for lack of loyalty, "We haven't left this room in four days..."

After a month of subterranean cohabitation, tiny flaws had enlarged to gaping cracks. The mystique had gone musty. Little, needling jabs had escalated to full-on harpoonings, delivered at rapid clip... "Honey, your design is just way too amateurish for my new website." "We both need work before we can pitch this project to the local paper... my project-management skills aren't that great, and you're just not a very good writer." "Yeah, my parents... they don't really, you know, like you that much."

Cruel barb aside, I wouldn't have liked me very much, either. I was a shadowy, puffy-eyed presence, scurrying into the kitchen under cover of darkness to make David sandwiches. Of course I wasn't terribly conversational. The fantasy for which I'd abandoned my family, my schooling and my rationality was crumbling to bits in front of me. Small talk was for those not attempting to hold an entire world together with trembling hands and unevenly-sliced tomatoes. My feeble, oversudsed and undercooked stabs at domesticity made me resemble a smudged-eyeliner version of the Myra Gale character in "Great Balls of Fire!”… young, desperate to please and prone to dissolving in tears and wailing, "I don't know HOW to be a good wife, Jerry Lee!"

In the movie, Jerry Lee comforted his poor, distraught, underage sweetheart. In real life, David snapped, "Well, I guess next time you'll know that barbecue sauce doesn't go too well with cream cheese", while ordering a pizza.

---

Three months in, the facade had more or less disintegrated. "Tell me more about what it's like," I'd whisper in bed, desperately trying to push him back into an intriguing but ill-fitting mold. "Maybe later... tired... too intense," he'd mutter, drifting off. If David really was the ringleader of a nefarious, multi-state crime syndicate, he apparently performed his duties during the twenty minutes a day I was in the shower. If he’d killed anyone, the deed must’ve been done in the BP, the Waffle House or his own driveway, because he certainly didn’t venture anywhere else. The driveway did feature a large, discolored stain. I was pretty sure it was motor oil rather than the blood of an enemy, an inferior, a sheep righteously culled.

In less than ninety days, the contract was irrevocably breached. The bloom was off the rose. The rosebush had been weed-whacked down to a stump. I was unwilling to face the truth and incapable of stomping out, slamming the door and stepping into the daylight. This was my one and only future. I’d sold my morality and my soul for this vacation, and I was damned if it was going to be rained out.

"I am you," I'd whisper to myself during my protracted shower-cries, tracing our initials on steam-fogged glass, "I am you, I am you, I am you."

I'd lie beside him at night, tracing my fingers over his skin, trying to memorize his scent. Tears trickling down my face, sobbing silently so I didn’t wake him.

---

It ended abruptly. Just-like-that. In retrospect, it’s a wonder my sojourn lasted as long as it did. David was constantly in search of the new, the neuron-tickling, the Next Big Thing. He’d exhausted the possibilities of a fragile, fawning live-in acolyte well before April reared its blossom-bedecked head.

It was six AM. We’d stayed up all night, drinking warmish Jack ‘n Dew, alternately pawing one another and retreating to our separate computer chairs, damp and restless, tapping out our mutual dissatisfaction.

“I’m sending you home.” David turned to me, lapis eyes vivid. “First thing tomorrow.”

So this is shock, I thought as my face went cold and my hair prickled.

“You’re kidding,” I said, more accusation than question.

“This isn’t fun any more- ,” he began.

“I know, I know, babe,” I pleaded, “But I’m trying so hard, every day…”

“That’s not what I’m talking about,” said David. “I never really loved you. This was a game… a test to see how much you’d believe, how far you’d go. I gotta say, I'm proud... you took it all the way. And you were twisted enough to actually LIKE it. But you’re not me. You’re nothing like me, not even after three months of trying to be a fucking chameleon. It’s getting old.”

“Was ANY of it true?” I blurted, still glued in the same position, my eyes dry, wide and terrified.
“I’m not going to tell you. Maybe the whole thing was a game. Maybe it was all true, and because part of me does love you, I’m protecting you from me and my life. You’re never going to know. Ever.”

Just as I’d kept a 4” Gerber in my boot, David kept a loaded .22 on his desk. I looked at it, sitting under a burrito wrapper. My hands twitched ineffectually in my lap.

“Don’t even fucking think about it,” said David. “First, a .22 round would only piss me off, and then I’d have to kick your ass. Second… that’s not you. Can’t you tell that by now?”

“No,” I blubbered, tears finally coursing down my chilly face, “You can’t… I won’t… there’s no one else in the world like me…”

“There are PLENTY of people like you,” he said, the last word brimming with happy disgust. “Here’s the phone. Call your parents and tell them you’re flying home tomorrow morning.”

“No,” I blurted, inching my chair away, “Can’t…”

“Well, do whatever the fuck you’d like. I’ll call them. You’re still going home.”

I was free. I was catatonic. I was a 120-amp fuse, overloaded with emotional agony, waiting to break, waiting to blow, and yet inexplicably still sitting here, staring at a stranger with a thin smile and a United Airlines envelope in his hand.

---

The next few days are a pile of blurry snapshots. I remember sleeping with David twice that evening, trying to hold on to just a little of his sweat, his spit, him. Oddly, it wasn’t the worst sex I’ve ever had. I remember packing my beloved stuffed giraffe and birth certificate, leaving my platform sneakers and copy of “ANSWER Me!”. I remember being handed a twenty to buy a snack while in transit (unnecessary; I didn’t eat for nearly a week). I remember David’s father briskly shaking my hand, an impersonal farewell to an impersonal acquaintance. I remember stepping off the plane and seeing my father, remember how he walked up and held me tightly for what seemed like hours, didn’t say a word as I sobbed into his flannel shirt.

---

My sister Sarah claims that my capacity for emotional recovery is much like Wolverine’s healing factor. “Dude,” she’s marveled, “You get pistol-whipped by some totally awful trauma, and thirty seconds later, you’re peeling yourself off the ground, spitting out gravel and yelling, ‘Was that shit really necessary?’!”

This is not strictly accurate.

My first days home from Georgia were quite educational. I learned that while it’s possible to live on diet Coke, it’s not a great idea for your teeth or your psyche. I learned that crying yourself to sleep, crying intermittently through the night and crying before you open your eyes in the morning doesn’t leave a person particularly bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. I learned that no matter how much you wish it would, a broken heart won’t kill you.

Most importantly, however, I learned how to fake it.

I didn’t want to wake up in the morning. I faked it.
I didn’t want to be conscious. Ever. I faked it.
I didn’t want to interact with my family. I faked it.
I didn’t want to eat or smile or put on a snappy little suit and interview for secretarial jobs. I faked it.

The only thing I really wanted to do was sit in front of the computer, chatting with David, eagerly lapping up my daily ration of emotional abuse, frantically trying to wheedle my way back into his heart. It would be another six months before his grip on my mind and spirit would begin to grow slack.

In the interim, I dated men I couldn’t stand. I saw silly, explosion-laden movies. I went to Friendly’s at three in the morning, scalded my innards with Buffalo wings and coffee, wrote bad, lovesick poems on napkins. I got my second tattoo, a stylized outline of David’s beloved silver ring, a heavy, hand-formed knot which had briefly served as my engagement ring.

And I faked it.

Living – no matter how forced and arbitrary and tiresome – is still not grieving. If you do enough of the former, it’ll eventually start to seem more pleasant and endurable than the latter. Eventually, despite yourself, you’ll utter one genuine laugh, enjoy a plate of homemade spaghetti, nod your head awkwardly to a good, bassy song.

At which point you’ll promptly burst into tears. But it’ll happen again… soon.

You don’t fake it ‘til you make it, exactly. You fake it until time inches forward, the world changes shape and the disingenuous existence you fashioned becomes Velveteen Rabbit-real.

You fake it ‘til it’s made FOR you.

---

It’s been seven years, five months and some-odd days since I returned home. Some very odd days, indeed, as well as some tremendously happy and fulfilling ones. I’ve never had that second tattoo removed; the memory, like the ink, is indelible. I no longer grieve for David. I harbor no delusions of finding the “one other person in the entire world” who shares my snarled strand of emotional DNA. It’s all mine and one-of-a-kind. But that experience – the scary, the sad, the humiliating – is part of it, too. I never want to forget.

I was seventeen. It doesn’t excuse, it doesn’t explain and it doesn’t change.

When I was seventeen, I let a dark, not-entirely-normal part of myself rage out of control. I fed it, nurtured it, flaunted it, and lured a monster to my doorstep. Not a psycho-killer, but someone capable of showing me what my worst, most hateful tendencies would look like in a few years unless I tried very, very hard keep them pinned beneath my boot heel. Who’s sicker – someone falsely claiming to be a killer, or someone genuinely drawn to that person?

The fault lies with me… because it is me. One doesn’t annihilate the dark half so much as work each day to keep it in remission.

I’m as kind and loving to my family, my friends and my son as I can possibly be. I devote myself fully to living a good, moral life because I know it’s a choice. I fight for it with every particle of my being. I surround that dark blotch on my soul with compassion, understanding, sympathetic words and helpful works. I fake like it doesn’t exist… and pretend - or hope - that someday, maybe it won’t.

Psycho Killer - Pt. I

I don't dedicate.
Nonetheless...
For C.

The New Jersey public school system, Stolichnaya, C-SPAN, the Unabomber, my abnormal psych professor, Sub Pop Records and ENIAC are all partially to blame.

But it's mainly on me. Or rather, the sixteen year-old version of me.

Now, maybe the sixteen year-old you was a delightful, upstanding young adult, starring in drama club productions, dishing up meals at the soup kitchen and never letting your boyfriend's hands bypass the orcas swimming across your Sierra Club t-shirt.

Sixteen Year-Old Jul, however, was a monstrous little bastard. I was poorly-informed, endlessly-opinionated, incredibly foul-mouthed (well, some things never change). I was chubby, shy and ensnared in an H.R. Giger painting's worth of orthodontia. I was also deep in the throes of Teenage Ebola: low self-esteem and enormous ego, battling for control within a single body, leaving the host in piss-poor shape for the duration.

I didn't have a boyfriend... but that was because teenage boys were malodorous, slack-jawed cretins. My teachers were liars, charlatans and entirely too fond of poly-blend separates. My parents were cruel oppressors with archaic views of freedom, personal responsibility and the difference between "clean dishes" and "dishes still encrusted with recognizable chunks of Stroganoff, so re-wash them again NOW, young lady".

I kept a 4" pocket knife tucked in one Doc Marten at all times, presumably as proof of my Junior Bad-Ass League membership. I'd practice flicking it open with one hand while alone in my bedroom, periodically losing my grip and spearing my Kermit the Frog pillow.

I should not have been left in charge of a goldfish bowl, let alone my own path to adulthood.

All of this elaborates, but doesn't explain. And it most definitely doesn't excuse.

---

Shortly after I turned seventeen, I made the biggest mistake of my life. In a somewhat off-kilter tribute to the Talking Heads, I'm going to call him David.

We met online in September.

By Halloween, we were deliriously in love.

By Thanksgiving, I'd made plans to leave college and move to Georgia to be with him.

Around the time of the first snowfall, I packed up my stuffed animals and broad collection of misanthropic literature, hopped in my father's dung-colored K-car and sputtered off towards my destiny.

Thing is, around Election Day, we'd had the following instant-message exchange.

David: You know, I've killed before.
Jul: Um... seriously?
David: I've never told anyone, obviously, but I know I can trust you. And I'm absolutely not joking.
Jul: Hmmmmn. Tell me more...

Not incredulity, not horror, not shock... "tell me more".

Psycho killer / qu'est-ce que c'est?

That's stuck with me, more than anything else which happened during that tumultuous, heartbreaking, life-shaping year. "Tell me more".

Fa fa fa fa fa fa fa fa fa...

I've forgiven David. You already know where his story is headed (nowhere, fast, bottle of Depakote rattling alongside).

Someday, I may forgive myself.

---

The day of my sixteenth birthday, I woke up, chugged a diet Mountain Dew and dropped out of high school. Tired of being an awkward, geeky outcast, I planned to both reinvent myself and achieve my true potential at Scrub Pine Community College. The latter goal got off to a ripping start; my first semester GPA was a Rod Carew-like 4.0. However, I was still horrifically geeky.... and now, I was paying for the privilege of being ignored by my classmates. I sat alone in the dining hall each day, nibbling a homogeneous chicken patty and shooting daggers at my sheep-like inferiors. My romantic life was limited to a few clumsy liaisons with an aloof Lothario who disappeared for weeks on end and returned my breathy, "I'm so in love with you!", with a measured, "Well, I care for you as well, BUT...".

Things clearly hadn't gone the way I'd imagined. This chapped my pompous little ass to no end. How DARE life deviate from my meticulously-crafted plan? Had I been older and less insufferable, I could have reevaluated my options. Had I been humbler, I could've saved years of strife and reevaluated myself. I could've said hello to the early-education majors, rather than attempting to ignite their scrunchies with the force of my glare.

I was sixteen. It doesn't excuse, but it'll have to explain.

While watching a filmstrip in Abnormal Psychology class one afternoon, I decided that the explanation for my social difficulties was blindingly simple: I was afflicted with antisocial personality disorder... in other words, a sociopath.

I'll repeat: sixteen.

I'd received a copy of the DSM-IV as a birthday present several months earlier. Soon, the section devoted to ASPD had been burnished to a soft gleam by my eager little fingers. "This is SO ACCURATE!" I marveled, copying choice diagnostic criteria onto pastel index cards, "I DO fail to conform to social norms!" I carried this small stack of symptomology with me at all times, periodically pausing in 7-11 or the campus bookstore to leaf through them and murmur, "I HAVE rationalized having hurt, mistreated, or stolen from another! Why, just yesterday I punched Junket because she stole my Dr Pepper-flavored lip gloss! If that doesn't indicate a lack of conscience, I don't know WHAT does!"

I applied a zestful, can-do spirit towards nurturing my newfound sociopathy. I spent hours analyzing the seminal hate-zine "ANSWER Me!" as though it were a misanthropic Dead Sea scroll. I located and downloaded the most graphic, disturbing images I could find (crime-scene snapshots, an infamous Steve Albini album cover) in an attempt to "desensitize" myself to them. I stared at my bright, bratty little sisters and exhausted but doting parents and tried (in vain, thankfully) to convince myself that I felt no emotion towards them whatsoever. It was an unsustainably strange way to live; had things gone differently, I'm sure I would have retired the close-range shotgun-blast photos and unsmiling facade within a few months.

Then I met David.

---

My first-ever website was a slow-loading monstrosity known as "Craven Chicky's Wicked Lair" (my screen name having been inspired by Craven Walker, inventor of the Lava Lamp). In addition to a 50MB WAV file of my sister belching punk rock lyrics, it also featured some half-decent (if painfully immature) writing. One day, I received an e-mail from "VitriolLad88", complimenting me on my angry teenage wordsmithery and asking if I'd be interested in chatting on instant messenger. Attention- and affection-starved, I installed ICQ and sent him a message less than five minutes later ("So, what's a nice boy like you doing on a worldwide interconnected computer network like this?").

Later that day, he and I exchanged ten minutes' worth of witty banter.

The next day, we chatted for several hours.

The day after that, the drug really took hold. We stayed up all night, exchanging flirtatious bon mots, deep-rooted secrets and shared hatred of the civilized world. At nine AM, I staggered off to school, exhausted but grinning. In between classes, I scurried to the computer lab to see if a particularly vitriolic lad had fired off any new correspondence.

Of course he'd sent a gorgeous e-mail. Of course it was five pages long.

---

David, you see, was manic-depressive, unmedicated by choice. Falling in love with a person in the grips of an active mania is sort of like riding a malfunctioning roller coaster. The experience is so fantastically exhilarating that it takes you a little too long to notice that something's wrong. By then, you're strapped in place, going ninety miles an hour and helpless to do anything but close your eyes and pray.

Youth is idiocy, enthusiasm is contagious and mistakes are inevitable. Within weeks, I was gone... catastrophically in love and deep under David's spell. Even when young and idealistic, I hadn't been terribly young or idealistic... no bacon-thwarted attempts at veganism, no circulating hand-scrawled petitions at the mall. My bond with this mysterious stranger living eight hundred miles away was the first thing I was absolutely, positively sure of. We spent every spare moment online, chatting, conspiring, marvelling that we'd found the one other soul in the world which perfectly matched our own. "The words 'I love you' don't even come close," wrote David one night, "I AM you... pure and simple." I was enraptured, a believer at last. Never before (and, to be brutally honest, never since) have I felt so adored and adoring, so inextricably tethered to a lover's heart. "I want to gather all the false love I've bestowed upon other women, stack it like cordwood and set it alight," he wrote, "I want to make a massive, towering pyre in honor of everyone and everything which made me who I am, which made me capable of loving you."

Oh, he was good.

David's top-secret sinister "revelation" was delivered at 3 AM, roughly a month after we'd met. It had much the same effect on our nascent bond as tempering does on steel. My love was a killer... because he could, because he was bigger, greater, more powerful than any of society's rules. And I? I was the one woman in the world who knew him, through and through. I was him. I wouldn't blanch at his actions, I would celebrate them. My convictions were now exponentially stronger and more solid than they'd been before. My high-school acquaintances were buying prom dresses and beaten-up cars. I was buying a mythology. I was a feverish, twisted mess, intoxicated by love and potential, enraged by everything else. One night, in response to my escalating verbal abuse, my mother pleaded, "Jul, your family can't TAKE this anymore! You never, ever stop hurting us. I just don't think you can continue to live in this house."

"I don't think so, either," I replied icily (even though my teeth were clenched and my nails gouging divots in my palms), "I'm moving to Georgia... and I'm getting married."

Several days earlier, in a move which had made my already-inflamed heart practically rupture, David had been referring to me as his "wife".

It was the brass ring. It was my whole world, my destiny.

It was, as it turned out, nothing as I'd imagined. But I'd find that out soon enough.

"WHAT?", exclaimed my mother, "With... with the guy you've been talking to on the computer? Are you insane?"

"You have no idea", I replied.

To Be Continued...

Tales Out of Camp - Pt. II

I have all sorts of notes compiled for a post about moving to Philadelphia, including such gems as "LIGHTBULBS, 10 PM: WHO DO I HAVE TO BLOW TO GET ONE IN THIS TOWN?", "GAS STATION MINI-MART: HAS HIBACHIS AND TEN DIFFERENT KINDS OF ROLLING PAPERS BUT NO LIGHTBULBS? WHAT UP W/THAT? IF YOU'RE STONED AND EATING A HOT DOG, YOU WON'T CARE THAT YOU'RE DOING IT IN THE DARK?!" and the delightful "NOT ONLY IS THIS NOT MY STREET, BUT THIS NEIGHBORHOOD SEEMS TO HAVE AN AWFUL LOT OF BAIL BONDSMEN!"

However.

Ever since my last post, it's been nothing but, "But what about the SWINGERS?", "Tell us about the swingers RIGHT NOW!", etc. I had no idea that my heavily-domesticated audience would be so enraptured by tales of debauchery. I may have found the most lucrative crossover market since Spanglish pop ("If you don't give me todo su amor, I'll kick your culo right out that door!"): gonzo journalism for the PB&J set. You're not quite ready for German scheisse porn, but you're going to poke your own eyeball out with a rubber-tipped spoon if you don't find a form of entertainment more titillating than "Goodnight Moon" (which I generally finish reading to my short-attention-spanned infant thusly: "Goodnight to the following: bears, chairs, bowl of gruel, disturbing anthropomorphic rabbits. Goodnight noises everywhere, including the ones YOU'RE going to make when mommy unceremoniously dumps you in your crib").

On with the show!

When we last left our intrepid ("intrepid" being a kind euphemism for "drunk") heroine, she was trekking across a darkened field in search of a rumored swingers' party. Her flagrantly silly imagination ran wild during her brief stroll... Jenna Jameson-esque nymphs being lashed to logs with vines, nudes prancing around a moonlit pond, pine cones being employed in ways the original tree definitely wouldn't condone. Upon reaching the campground's pool, however, those naughty-Narnian fantasies (perfect title, should any adult-movie producers wish to whiz on C.S. Lewis' grave: "The Layin', the Bitch and the Whore-Probe") were laid to waste even faster than her present use of the clunky third-person tense.

It was... professional. Slick. Completely, consummately competent.

There was a bar! A DJ! Inflatable pool sharks! Women in Gap bikinis sipping Cosmos!

At that moment, a part of my soul left my body, dissolved into the layer of steam blanketing the pool and floated lazily into the night.

For me, grown-up activities have always been the antithesis of diamonds: best when unpolished.

The first time Junket and I tried pot, we weren't aware of the availability of commercial rolling papers. As a result, our first-ever shared joint was approximately 8" long and bright orange as a result of being rolled on... origami paper. It's one of my favorite memories, and it's largely because of - rather than despite - the coughing, sputtering, and combustion of enough orange dye to mutate the next-door neighbors' DNA.

One of the best kisses of my life occurred mere moments after my co-osculator had consumed a Big Mac. I may be the last person in America who has never tried one of those delightfully caloric concoctions. I always figured there wasn't really any point; by the time I was done customizing it, I'd be left with nothing but a forlorn sesame-seed bun. When it comes to burgers, I'm a purist... no stupid lettuce, no briny-ass pickles, no reeking onions, no baptism by sauce, no matter how purportedly "special".

I remember that kiss, though - fast-food lights reflected in my boyfriend's glasses, his fingers hesitantly twining through my hair, the deep, gas-slurping thrum of the Ford Granada in which we were parked - better than any of the thousands of more ideal lip-locks I've experienced since.

Clearly, not everyone shares this view... hence the popularity of lab-created babes such as Pamela Anderson-Lee-Lee-Rock. But again, personally, the perfection's in the imperfections. And watching women with better hair than I'll ever have aquatically gyrate to "Can't Get You Out Of My Head" sucked all the eroticism out of that scene faster than a flotilla of expensive penis pumps.

"So... is this your first Eros Adventures event?" asked Raoul (note: all names and identifying details changed to protect the... um, not-so-innocent?). "Um... I guess?" I said. I was huddled in the shallow end, sipping the remnants of my rum 'n Gatorade and doing what I do best: no, not THAT, smart ass... observing. During the event's first hour, my observations were limited to the following:

- If these are enlightened, adventurous grown-ups, then why are they all standing on opposite sides of the pool like kids at a junior-high dance?

- Attention, women confronting post-childbirth "spread": while I'm truly happy if you can embrace your body's new contours, objectively speaking, you MIGHT not want to descend a waterslide nude at this point in your life. I'm just sayin'.

"So... whaddya think?" said Raoul. An older, less-intolerably-hammy version of Cuba Gooding Jr., he and his taciturn blonde girlfriend were frequent Eros Adventures attendees. "Uh... I kinda thought there'd be... y'know... more HAPPENING," I stammered. Apart from the occasional al fresco waterslider, the event was surprisingly tame. Couples clung together, rarely venturing apart to chat up their fellow attendees. "It's still early," said Raoul, "Things'll heat up!" "Say," he said, eyes lowered, "Those are some NICE breasts you have there. Mind if I... touch them?"

If my libido had been wounded by the earlier Ethel-Merman-meets-Kylie-Minogue acrobatics, Raoul's eerily polite request for a handful of tit flat-out killed it. It was the spirit of adventure (coupled with the unavoidable fact that my boobs are like the town bicycle's horn - everyone's had a squeeze!), however, which led me to say, "Sure, knock yourself out."

It was then, my mammary suspended in Raoul's respectful grip, that I had an epiphany.

"Actually, I have a confession to make," I said, more literate than I'd been all evening ("Um... waterslide... naked... chafing?"). "I'm a writer, and I'm here to learn more about your lifestyle."

"Really?" said Raoul, dropping my boob like an ignited potato. "Well, what do you want to know?"

As it turns out, rather than being disappointed that they wouldn't get to feast on my supple (um... jiggly? Squish-tastic?) young flesh, the swingers were delighted to discuss their lives, loves and pervy peccadilloes. It also turns out that - unlike casual group sex - I have a natural affinity for the writer's role. Never was I more comfortable than sitting back, watching the action (Raoul was right... while no slippery orgies broke out amongst the FunNoodles, I did get the dubious pleasure of seeing a man orally serviced to the Violent Femmes' "Blister in the Sun"... something tells me Gordon Gano would approve) and interrogating the participants about the interesting twists and lubed-up turns which their lives had taken to bring them to that particular moment. About that, I have to say this:

- While each of the people with whom I spoke had a fascinating back story, I have a feeling that any given individual off the street would’ve been just as interesting. In this culture, in these crazy, topsy-turvy, CrunchWrap-fueled times (note: I've got nothing against the CrunchWrap. It's got more angles than any other fast-foodstuff, so it's a-okay by me. I'm actually looking forward to the development of the CrunchDodecahedron in a decade or so), people rarely open up to one another. We miss this shared dialogue with our fellow humans... hence the popularity of alcohol (KY Jelly for the consciousness) and reality TV.

- Despite their free-lovin', self-confident ways, the swingers were some of the most uptight individuals I've ever met in terms of their raw hunger for acceptance. To a person, everyone with whom I spoke wanted nothing more than for popular society to stop ridiculing, lambasting and persecuting the polyamorous populace. Now, forgive me if I'm being insensitive, but I was unaware of any widespread malice towards those of the swingin’ persuasion. At very least, they don't face the daily challenges of, say [gays, Jews, blacks, the handicapped, immigrants]. I doubt very much that members of any truly marginalized population would take kindly to the swinger's heartfelt pleas for understanding.

Like all good (or at least perversely fascinating) things, my stint as pseudo-interviewer to the rurally wanton had to come to an end. While I was chatting with the adorable female bartender about her current husband, her former husband and the impossibility of utter honesty, a shirtless, Kris Kristofferson-ish man strode up to me.

"So... you're the writer?" he said in a not-entirely-friendly tone.

"Yup!", I chirped, oblivious.

"Well, GREAT!" snarled his companion, a stringy, Crypt Keeper-ish blonde. "Although I don't suppose it matters NOW... party's already over!"

True to her words, lip- (and other appendage) locked groups had begun drifting away from the pool, presumably for adventures of a differently-steamy nature.

"See, we're a little SENSITIVE to the media's portrayal of our way of life," said AngrySwinger, "Ever since our last meeting spot got shut down because a story in the local paper made everyone all hysterical."

"Why can't you people just leave us alone?" spat FuriousWife.

Not having the heart (or humility) to 'fess up that I only "wrote" for an audience of dozens and $4.79 a month in AdSense revenue, I sputtered, "Um... trust me, y'all don't have to worry about anything from me."

"Yeah, whatever," said FuriousWife, "Like I said, the party's OVER."

"My wife's just a little worried about what happened last time," said AngrySwinger apologetically, "We'd appreciate it if you didn't use any names or identifying details (note: I didn't... please don't kill me, swingers!)... maybe just say something positive about alternative lifestyles?"

"I think I can do that," I said, not wanting to be found dead in the woods with a Hitachi Magic Wand-shaped divot in the back of my skull. "You were all really nice, interesting people" (which is true, the fact that I found their gathering roughly as erotic as Sunday mass notwithstanding).

"Thanks," said AngrySwinger, "Time for us to get going now."

I took that as my queue to vacate the premises, which I did rapidly but happily, bounding across rocks and logs with giddy glee.

"Where the hell WERE you?" marveled my companions when I strolled back into camp. "You were gone for, like, THREE HOURS!"

"DUDE!" I yelled, "I... I... PISSED OFF A BUNCH OF SWINGERS! AND I NEED TO WRITE ABOUT IT, NOW!"

"It's four in the morning... you're INSANE," they said as I rolled up my sleeping bag and busted down my tent, intent on heading towards a keyboard as quickly as possible (which, after minor detours such as "caring for short-tempered short person" and "moving to Philadelphia", I did).

I s'pose, in addition to lovers and fighters, there is a third group in which people can be pigeonholed... writers. And while I may not have discovered how to have repeated, Mt. Vesuvius-caliber orgasms or vogue to "Get Down Tonight", I was rather happy to learn that I'm a minor, nonprofessional member of the Scribe Tribe. Swing THAT, suckers.

Tales Out of Camp - Pt. I

There are many lessons to be learned while immersed in nature. This goes a long way towards explaining the popularity of Tevas, s'mores and college students embarking upon Carlos Casteneda-ish psychedelic journeys, during which they attain an understanding that God and Nature are but two halves of the same golden entity, arcing eternally across space-time, only to later determine that, shit, they must've wandered away from the campsite and into the parking lot of the local McDonald's again.

It was armed with this knowledge (but neither peyote buttons nor hacky-sack) that I recently ventured into the forest primeval for a restorative camping trip.

Oh, who am I kidding? I pitched a tent on a field within walking distance of a 7-11 with the express purpose of running around in a wet bathing suit and eating Pop Tarts and rum for breakfast. The only mystical insights gleaned during the trip were along the lines of, "Is there any way to make floating in the pool even LESS strenuous?" (answer: suspend your Pop Tart-bloated frame upon enough foam pool toys to re-buoy the Titanic!) and "How can I avoid contracting salmonella while cooking chicken in an area without running water?" (after wiping hands on grass, tree, rocks, pants and unsuspecting co-camper's rain fly, abandon conventional food-safety measures and just slosh high-test beverages on hands often enough to hopefully eliminate any pathogens).

The trip was ostensibly centered around an Irish folk-music festival. While this fostered a gentle, communal atmosphere not present at, say, the Warped Tour, most attendees were more interested in arboreal alcoholism than music. The Gaelic theme mainly served as a not-unpleasant background note, somewhat like eating at Bennigan's, only with less melted cheese and chipotle-ranch sauce. Occasionally, we were roused from our midday naps and semi-cooked chicken-consumption by a particularly boisterous tune. I will now attempt to recall a representative sample in the most patently offensive manner possible:

"Laddies 'n lassies, please welcome the O'Blarnigans with their hit single, "Begorrah!"

[frantic fiddling]

"Begorrah! Begorrah! Begorrah! Begorrah!
Blimey, cor and crikey! Blood pudding, leprechauns!
Guinness, "The Commitments" and now 'n then car bombs!"

It's a good thing the whole IRA cease-fire occurred, otherwise I'd be a LITTLE hesitant to start up the Civic tomorrow.

After the sun had set and the last accordion had ceased bleating, we sprawled around a glowing lantern, smacking at mosquitoes, sipping truly horrendous drinks (including the perennial favorite, "Diet Coke and... y'know, something. Heavy on the something!") and shooting the breeze. As is typical with this oh-so-effete crowd, the discussion soon turned to sex... who was having it, where they were having it, were any kitchen implements involved? "Really? A POTATO masher?" Earlier in the day, rumors had surfaced that a group of swingers would be meeting in the vicinity later that evening. "Y'know... for SWINGING!" went the gleefully-repeated refrain (as opposed to swingers who congregate in order to analyze one another's investment portfolios, I suppose). "Dude, we TOTALLY need to go check it out!", said one excited fellow camper, "There's no single guys allowed, so I'll hafta find a chick to pretend to marry. Wouldn't THAT be a hell of a honeymoon?" Despite our shared juvenile titillation, no one could muster sufficient nerve to set down their drink and venture off in search of Alternative Lifestyles of the Rural 'n Shameless.

Except... me (att'n, family: feel free to continue reading. Only OTHER people's cottage-cheesy asses are featured in this tale).

I'm generally quite shy, the quintessential observer, what I like to refer to in my more purple-prose moments as a "social moth": at any given gathering, I cling to the wall and soak it all in.

Perhaps it was this interest in amateur sociology which led to what happened next. Perhaps it was an abundance of "something"-heavy libations.

I prefer, as always, to blame indie rock.

Earlier that week, I'd heard Pavement's "Spit on a Stranger" for the first time; to say I liked it would be a laughable understatement. It had lodged itself in my brain more firmly than the mutant offspring of "Don't Fear the Reaper" and the Kit-Kat jingle. I especially loved the lyric, "I see the sunshine in your eyes... I'll try the things you'll never try", delivered by Stephen Malkmus in a lilt so breathy, so god-awful PRETTY as to be capable of making a woman's panties disintegrate from ninety yards away.

I'll try the things you'll never try.

"That's IT, I'm goin' in," I proclaimed, pulling a skirt over my soggy bathing suit and setting out across the field.

TO BE CONTINUED...