You are still a woman, at least you were the last time you checked. You check again, just to make sure. While you’re at it you admire your tan lines. Yup, doing good.

If you were the sun you’d kiss you too.

Day four.

You sleep badly but it’s of no consequence. To awake with a faceful of such beauty is almost visually jarring, then immediately soothing. Nature can really blow the socks off you sometimes, even when you aren’t wearing any, like now, because it’s too damn hot. The thought of socks makes your toes twitch. If your toes had faces they’d be frowning.

You are not alone. Your friend is asleep next to you, travel weary and slightly late to the party, but determined to make up for it. She arrived last night, an angel in a shuttle, coasting along a tar-black road on a tar-black night. The generators were down and the hotel was saturated in darkness. You’d given up waiting for her and were heading out for a drink, and you knew, the second before it happened, that when you stepped out of the shadows and into the streetlight, you’d find each other. It was so. The bus lights illuminated you, you both screamed with joy.

Kismet. Boom. Welcome to Tulum.

Now there are two.

You look around. This is, quite honestly, the sexiest room you’ve ever stayed in. You decide to stay another night, even though you can’t afford it, because life is short and there’s no use hoarding your nana’s fine china for special occasions. You’ve got to bust that shit out and let it get used and chipped and broken. The ancient Egyptians were wrong, you can’t take stuff with you when you die, and money is no exception. You think this, and you wonder, ruefully, if you’ll feel the same thing in a week when you check out your depleted bank balance.

You shrug.

Bartender!?

This morning you swim and wander, meeting people and making new friends. You run into friends of friends from Burning man and the synchronicity of everything reaffirms the right-on-ness of your decision to come here. You’re blessed to have your partner in crime with you. Her spirit helps to elevate you. She is a torch shining light upon you whenever your darker side appears. You are grateful.

You teach two people to bodysurf and watch your friend whirl topless cartwheels in the sand. This is the day you almost drown in the unforgiving ocean from uncontrollable laughter. It would not have been a bad way to go.

Day five.

At some point in the night the wind stops. At first this feels like blessed relief but soon you become aware of two things: it’s much hotter now, and, the mosquitos are coming.

Itchy, you seek solace in the ocean. You delight in confusing the swarming halo of bloodsuckers that hover overhead by diving beneath the waves and appearing elsewhere. Karma is a bitch.

The wind picks up before noon and blows your angelic crown of little devils away. Good riddance.

It’s time for a frosty beverage and you go inside to help prop up the bar. You’re selfless like that.

You hear that one of your heroes has passed away. Gil Scott Heron, ivory tickler and deep throated poet, a man who inspired you with his blunt honesty and heart stained sleeves. Gil always told the truth. Always. About his drug use, his mistakes, his lessons learned.

You drink a beer in his honor and play “Give Her a Call” before you sleep. It makes you feel sad and small and you miss the person you’ve been missing even more. You wish he would listen to that song. You wish he would really listen to it. Your heart hurts and you fall asleep with one hand on your heart and the other between your legs, holding yourself together, fearing you may break in half.

Day six.

You escape the beach and drive inland towards the ruins of Coba. You pass small villages where small statured women in bright dresses beat rainbows of hanging rugs with wooden poles and skinny dogs dart into traffic, trying to give you a heart attack and make you accountable for the portion of the car insurance that Hertz said isn’t covered by the ‘full liability coverage’ you purchased. Oh, Mexico.

In Coba you visit an ancient Mayan ruin dedicated to the honey bee. It makes you happy that an entire race of people worshipped the tiny creature you consider your totem. You hug the temple. It feels old and warm.

You ask a Mayan what he thinks about the paranoid among us who believe 2012 will be the end of the world. He laughs and says people should chillax. The world will keep on bumping along, long after we’ve killed ourselves off, he tells me. So there you go. Straight from a Mayans mouth.

Afterwards you drive to an underground cenote and jump 30 feet from a platform into cool fresh water while bats circle stalactites and small, fearless fish nibble your toes. It is quiet down there. It’s like a church. You’re in a holy place and you let the solitude and quiet envelop you until other humans come and break the peace. You leave.

The drive back is marred by the deaths of hundreds of butterflies. Perhaps thousands. They fly with such grace and beauty across the road ahead of you, and hit your windshield with such violence that it’s impossible not to gasp at every splat. Little yellow wings dot the asphalt. It’s carnage. There is nothing to do but grip the wheel and drive.

You make a pit stop at the police station on the way back to the beach to retrieve your license plate. The police have been kind enough to hold it for you after they removed it from the front of your car as punishment for a parking violation. They look so officious in their uniforms. You are tempted to do something weird so you can be thrown into a Mexican jail, just for a few hours, because you know what an awesome story it would make. Nothing like that happens. You pay your fine and retrieve your property.

Back at the hotel you are offered a cookie.

What kind of cookie, you ask.

It’s not peyote, you are told.

Seriously, what’s in it, you insist.

Everything, and nothing, comes the reply.

You eat the cookie.

The cookie messes you up.

You regret the cookie.

Bad cookie.

Day seven.

You are both awake at dawn, fuzzy-muddle-muggle-headed and confused from the night before. You watch the sunrise from different vantage points along the beach. You’re hungry and wish ceviche was on the breakfast menu. There is not enough ceviche in Mexico to satisfy your cravings for it.

Today you receive the most perfect massage of your life. You are a professional massage receiver, so this is no mean feat. You climb a ladder into a tall tree house and lay down on a bed with a view over the jungle and cenotes to the west. You undress and allow a gorgeous man with soulful eyes to manipulate your body and sing into your soul. When it ends you are happy. He is named for a holy book and for a minute you think about suggesting unholy things for the two of you to do together. But you don’t. Despite the mastery of his touch your body still feels like it belongs to another.

You drive back to your hotel to pack your things and prepare for an early departure. You watch the sun set and dream of never leaving. This place has captured a part of you. You run your fingers through the sand and find a pale pink shell. You let the shell slip through your fingers and into the foam. Take nothing but memories, leave nothing but footprints, you murmur.

In the morning you’ll be gone, but you know you will be back. You’ve made too many friends here.

Day eight.

You rise again at dawn. The drama of the sunrise sucks a gasp from your breast as you lay beneath a light blanket on a beach chair and watch it all unfold. A scoop of pelicans flies low over the breaking waves, heading North for breakfast, and two beach dogs play and chase each other with early morning abandon. You, a golden girl, swim in a pink ocean, wearing nothing but pink panties, watching pink light dapple the clouds above.

It’s time to go. Back to reality, back to life. Back to a new job and new beginnings. It all feels strange. You are excited and replenished. You love new things but you dream of beginning again something old, of making that precious thing new and improved. You take a deep breath. What will be, will be. You are deserving of love and lust and luck. You believe in yourself, perhaps truly for the first time.

Viva Mexico, where the police are thieves, where colors heal, where there’s no such thing as “margarita mix”, and where old VW Bugs come to die.

Hasta la vista.

Gracias.

YOU are a woman.

You might not have been a woman before you started reading, but for now, you most certainly are. Have fun with it, you slut.

You are a woman.

When you’re not being clumsy you are graceful. When you’re not burping loudly or swearing like a pirate you are a perfect lady. You’re tall and lean and walk like a warrior. You’re beautiful and desirable and some days you even know it. On those days you feel all powerful and let nothing stand in your way.

Your tomboy days are not far behind you but you feel, at 37, a connectedness to the maternal and feminine nature of the world that is hard to describe. The older you get on the outside the more confident you feel on the inside.

You are a woman, not a girl. Even without children you are a loving mother to those around you. Your womb is a giver of life, even if you never get the chance to birth more than your dreams.

You’re also on holiday in Mexico.

Day one.

You are a thousand miles from home and all alone. You do not speak the language or understand the signs, but you can read peoples faces and know from their eyes what they are really thinking. You feel safe with your skill set, a little unnerved, but safe. You drive a long and dusty road, stopping at several small hotels before you find the one that feels right. The smiles that greet you are like songs in your heart. Casa Violeta. This is the one, you know it. You take a room for one night only and it’s perfect.

You are in the ocean. The warm Atlantic. Waves seduce you. The foam fizzes and pops around you. You float upon a champagne sea. Salt water licks your skin. You allow the water to molest you and, when you’ve had your fill, you take your tired body and spread it softly on a beach towel and allow it to fall asleep before it’s finished drying. The sun takes over where the water has been. Nature violates you in the most blissful of ways.

All days should be like this.

You finish it with tequila and soft fish tacos, allowing the salsa to dribble down your chin.

Day two.

You wake. You’ve slept ten hours, lulled into dream states by the ever present thundering of waves crashing against the shore outside your walls. Drifting off to sleep by candlelight you knew you were in heaven and, more than anything, knew you were deserving of its peacefulness. You slept on top of the covers, naked but for frilly little knickers that made you feel cheeky, under a mosquito net that blew in the breeze. You awoke twice in the night. Once to the sound of a gecko barking a reptilian laugh into the darkness and once as dawn broke the horizon into a peach-purple explosion over a turquoise sea. The fireworks were framed by billowing curtains and swaying palms. You opened your eyes and smiled. The beauty and solitude provoked a flutter deep inside. After pleasuring yourself you fell back asleep with sticky fingers that tasted like the sweetest sea and a throbbing heartbeat between your thighs.

The beach is long and white and stands proud against the onslaught of winds and tide. Three blond dogs bounce and play in the waters edge, chasing the shadows of minnows. One of the dogs stops suddenly, hunches its back and strains with urgency as it empties its bowels, crapping into the shallows. From your towel you wrinkle your nose and take a long drag of luke warm cerveza. The dog, relieved, bounds through the water like a hound possessed. You are reminded of someone you know, a human, who also takes great pleasure from pooping. You smile. Simple pleasures, you think, and tip back the bottle to drain the last of your beer.

You’re in your new room. The wind is stronger now, the sound of the ocean even louder. It’s early afternoon and you fall into a nap, naked and salty, on a hanging bed suspended by thick ropes from the ceiling.

When you rise you are so relaxed that you feel drugged. In a disorientated stupor you dress for dinner. You are your own date and you dress to impress yourself. You pull your hair back into a ponytail and tie an orange strand of silk and silver bells around your wrist. From black tissue you extract a pair of huge gold hoops so heavy that they send a delicious tingle of pain through your lobes. They feel like a pinch on the ass from just the right person. There is no mirror, but you don’t need one. You know how good you look. Out you go.

Day three.

You have a hammock in your room. This is a good thing. You wish you had your person here to be naughty with… it’s the perfect height, the perfect everything for being naughty. Naughty is good. You moved here because it’s the most beautiful hotel on the beach and you simply couldn’t resist. And, more importantly, you had no one to tell you not to. No one to say “it’s too expensive” or “we can’t afford it”. Your inner voice tried to repeat those words to you but you told your inner voice to stuff itself and threw cash at the concierge. And now you have a hammock in your room.

You look around at the most perfect of surroundings and smell the scented air. Did I mention you are staying in a boutique perfumery? Yes, you are. Congratulations. The smell of orange blossoms clouds your brain and deludes you into bewitching fantasies. You let it happen. Good for you. Dreaming big is not for the faint of heart.

You are on vacation. You have escaped your life. You are a goddess in red bikini bottoms with a gold heart around your neck. You are present, you are alive, you are not broken – you are whole. And somehow, just a little bit, you’re surprised by it all.

You are you.

Now what do you do?

In the past several weeks I’ve given a lot of thought to reinvention. This is, in no small part, due to the fact that I’m trying to completely reinvent myself as a woman, friend, potential lover, and as a participator on this weird, spinning ball.

When faced with the unthinkable I’ve decided to embrace change and become better at everything.

It’s Spring. Birds are getting busy in trees and pastel-colored, pretty things are growing. Girls wear short skirts and pink lipstick smiles. Sex and sparkles scent the air.

Earlier this year my life exploded into a million shards of glittering, fragmented glass when the person I have dedicated the last few years to nurturing and loving left me and turned himself to stone. It was an almost unbearable shock. I wept and buckled, I careened into walls, I fell. Now, almost three months later, while still grieving, it’s time to dust myself off and emerge from the ashes. Shit, it’s time to chop those ashes into one long sooty line and inhale them through a rolled up hunji.

Phoenix, I am.

The trauma of loss forces Self under a microscope. This is a good thing. In the laboratory of post-love introspection I’ve come to several illuminating conclusions about my character, experimented with ways to reprogram it, and determined that anything is possible.

It’s no secret that I’ve been a temperamental bitch for most of my life. Only-child spoils and a sense of entitlement have taken decades to smooth over and grind down into some semblance of humility and connectivity with other humans. It’s taken my own lifetime thus far to shake the feeling that the entire world revolves around me, even though, on occasions, I know it still does. If I’m not careful, ever vigilant, my sense of entitlement, coupled with a massive dose of judgment, and, more often than not, a solid and unhealthy incomprehension of life when things are not going my way, can lead me astray. I am programmed to stomp my foot and throw a massive tantrum if my expectations are not reached.

Until recently I was not aware of just how badly I was failing at keeping my inner-monster at bay.

Like all of us, I have my dark stuff. My things to work on and improve. For the last few years I’ve complained bitterly about the city I live in, the weather, the poverty, the filth, the grime. I’ve felt lonely and blamed everyone else for the reasons I was discontent. I’ve demanded and pushed for alternatives without allowing myself to find beauty around me. I’ve constantly craved something different without allowing myself to see how truly lucky I already am.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m fucking awesome and I know it. I’m kind, I’m loving, I’m thoughtful and considerate. I care about people and stick up for underdogs. I confront things head on and will work and work and work on something until it’s completed. I am not a quitter. I’m smart and funny and creative and supportive. I am determined to love and evolve. I’m filled with passion and lust and excitement and a willingness to dream. I nurture people. I cook for them and care for them and play good little wifey. I’m a little bit kinky and a lot naughty. I’m still pretty. No, fuck that, I’m a fox.

Yay me.

It all counts for nothing when the person you love walks out the door.

It’s my solid belief that we’re all fucked-up quite deeply. Life and relationships are hard, but, if you’re lucky, you find someone, in all this craziness, whose fucked-upedness is something you can work with. Someone who’s fucked-up in a way you can live with and laugh at. I found that person. I loved him absolutely. His fucked-upedness was difficult and annoying and frustrating and sometimes made me want to throttle him, but I would never have walked away. I recognized his potential to grow around those few aspects of himself that weren’t always beautiful. I recognized our ability to be incredible partners and to help each other heal the holes we both had. God knows that through being together we were certainly able to see those holes. We triggered the stuff in each other that required work. To me that was a precious gift. I was committed to him. I had found my person. My partner in crime.

Not so for him.

And so, alone, I venture forth into a new era. Determined to combat the parts of me that I think need growth. I tackle new adventures. I give myself routines. I work hard and see results.

I wake up in the morning and practice “mouth yoga”, quite simply, I smile. I get up and write three pages of stream of consciousness rubbish and drink a perfect cup of tea. I do fifty kettle bell swings, some Bosu ball crunches, stretch and wonder at my new six pack (seriously). I read a daily meditation and either feel inspired or slightly annoyed at the cheesy vibe (this is still a process). I leave the house feeling accomplished and walk to work seeking out beautiful things along the way. I send happy thoughts out to passersby (“I hope you get laid tonight”, “I hope you find what you’ve been looking for”, “I hope you feel loved today”). At work I practice kindness and compassion even in the midst of all the madness. I do not let stress take over. If things get weird I remind myself that I am loved, lovable, successful, creative, a positive force in the world, a good boss, a great friend, a writer, a lover and a person deserving of incredible things. After work I swing kettlebell’s or go to therapy or acupuncture or a friends house or on an adventure. In bed I write down at least five things I am grateful for from the day and go online and fill in my daily positivity test. I go to sleep and try, every time you think of him, to send him kindness and love. On weekends I’m enrolled in Tango classes, Aerial Arts at the Circus School and am considering salsa, boxing and Capoiera. I’m becoming Super Activity Woman. My body hurts, my heart hurts, but I am very much alive. For a girl who once spent two years in a fetal position with clinical depression this is no mean feat.

In the past twelve weeks I’ve gone from a person who tends to look on the more pessimistic side of life to a person who celebrates the good stuff. I find myself looking for beauty. When I feel my demons rise I know to calm myself and find something in the present to inspire me: sunlight reflecting on a window, a flower in the breeze. My online positivity test has risen from below a 0.5 to 2.5 (out of 3). Stranger yet is the physical shift in my body. Even in the face of tremendous grief and emotional tumult my body is healing itself. For over two years I’ve limped and cringed with knee and foot pain. Not any more. I’m almost pain free.

Wishes do come true.

If those wishes counted for something I’d get time to do it all over. There’s nothing I’d love more than to be able to take these new tools and work towards building an incredible future with the person I love. But it’s an impossible and improbable dream.

He’s gone and I’m growing without him. There’s no going back.

Life goes on and it’s still beautiful. I’m busy filling my life with people and new experiences and have fallen in love with the city I used to hate. The fog is less oppressive and the omnipresent filth and grime look charming in the right light. Something deep and dark has shifted.

Without this break-up I cannot say I believe it would have happened.

It’s an interesting time.

Here, turn your volume up:

Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life

Friday, 5pm-

I’m holed up in a grand estate in Ojai, hiding from my life, pretending to be whole and happy, beset by hovering paparazzi in whirring helicopters that dance on the evening breeze as they try to steal a shot of the movie star next door.

I’m here, in a vast and ancient canyon, inside a rambling, Gothic house, feeling insecure and shifty, wondering if I belong. I’m not alone, you see. Oh no.

There are about thirty of me.

I’m part of a gaggle of writers fortunate enough to have the funds required to reserve a bed for the weekend. Except I’m actually not fortunate enough to be one of those writers with funds. I’m a blow in, a scholarship kid, a half-price wonder. The poor girl. I feel out of my depth, stupid, a black sheep. I wear my coat of shame. I question why I came here, what I’m doing, if I can hide away or leave.

I hear laughter all around me.

I look around at the kind eyes and excited, smiling faces. I hear snippets of conversation and begin to sense a common bond. I realize I’m part of one huge, pulsating, coagulated ball of shared insecurity, hope, humor and arrogance. We’re here because we can write. We know it. Sometimes we just forget. We’re all here to follow our leaders, to dance with our muses, to sit down and write.

This might just end up being fun.

Saturday, 6pm-

All over the house we are scrunched into chairs or crowded around tables, furiously scribbling or tapping on keys. If words need to be spoken they are whispered. Apart from a heated argument over breakfast about Richard Gere that turned into a fun conversation about genetically modified gerbils born without claws or teeth to make for safer insertion, it’s been a pretty mellow affair.

When we’re not writing we’re talking about writing. Or, we’re eating. We have a chef. It’s pretty fancy. I’m high on muse and an absence of chores and dirty dishes.

Throughout the day we’ve had classes with warm and encouraging teachers who gave various prompts and exercises that were both liberating as well as providing containment within a set of rules. It turns out I like having parameters and time constraints.

I dig the challenge. I feel competitive with myself. I fly.

This morning, for our first writing exercise, we were asked to make a list of masculine and feminine attributes and jobs, then we were told to pick a job and two attributes from each list to help round out a character of our opposite gender. The idea being that a character is more fully fleshed out, funnier and real if we incorporate attributes of the opposite sex.  We were given ten minutes to write, stream of consciousness style, about our character.

I chose a vain, burly fireman. His name his Hank. He is often perplexed and emotional. Enjoy!

I have a huge cock.

Sometimes I think that’s the only thing right with this world. This goddamn life. Sometimes, on bad days when I’m feeling low, I  look out the window at the city and just want to fucking scream, but then, if I choose, I can look in the mirror or down at the bulge in my pants and I feel reassured. Everything is going to be alright. I’m handsome. I’m packing heat.

I like being a fireman, sure. It’s ok. Fighting fires and rushing around is cool, I guess. But it’s the babes that are the biggest perk. The whistles and waves we get when we drive down the road in Big Red. The batted lashes, the smiles, the puffing up of breasts and wiggling of hips. This uniform gets me laid, yo’. Suckers.

The thing that gets me down is the death. It happens. I don’t get it. Sometimes we get there too late. We bust down doors and find bodies, perfectly still, externally unharmed, dead from smoke inhalation. Or worse. The krispy’s are much worse. The scars, the melted flesh. It’s a nightmare. The worst thing I ever saw was the body of a woman and her baby. A gas leak got ‘em. She had been breastfeeding. They were just sitting there on a sofa like some kind of demented installation. The worst kind of fucked up nativity scene. Her tit was out. They were so still. I cried. I broke down like a chick. It was a fucked up scene and I’ll never forget it.

That’s what I see in my mind that makes me wonder about this world, this life. I see that mother and her baby, sitting there in that quiet room. I hear the sirens. I smell the death. Nothing, not even the fact that I have a huge-ass penis can take that shit away.

And that’s a crying shame.

Hank was a very illuminating exercise for me. It was the first time I attempted to write a fictional character of the opposite sex. I never play with fiction. Whatever you think of the piece itself, the prompts were an incredible tool. The ten-minute constraint was invigorating, there was just no time to mess around. The moment I understood that I would have to write from the perspective of a male character I heard those words and I was off.

I have a huge cock.

It’s good to know that while so many parts of me feel broken, they certainly aren’t dead.

If you’d like to try this exercise in the comment section below then I fully endorse it. Write a list of about 15-20 attributes and jobs for each sex and pick a couple from each list. Set the timer for 10 minutes and write like a crazy person about a character (or person you know) from the opposite sex. Have fun!

*** If anyone would like to join the incredible Marilyn and her lovely Writing Pad staff for the October 2011 High Desert Retreat in the Joshua Tree then please check out this link! I’m hoping to be there (and so is Hank). ***

My love affair with America was inflamed today as I sat at the bar of Margie’s Diner on the verge of the 101.

Lit up by determined, crimson letters flashing *Real Food* *Real Food* *Real Food* a man in a stained and faded hunting jacket stirred his coffee for the seventh minute and a waitress licked her lips and winked at me… and my heart skipped a beat.

It was beautiful.

I fell in love with the weirdness and color of it all. I fell in love with the familiarity.

The parts of America that I adore are always reminiscent of old movie sets and 70′s television.

I’m road-tripping, so my heart and eyes are open. I feel full. Full of Real Food and Real Emotions. I finish eating, brave the rain and keep driving. South. The road dips and curves and carries me further along in the shadows of the never-ending parade of Golden Arches and stern-faced Colonels. Fast food nation. Unreal food.

The windshield wipers scratch against the glass.

Soon the McMalls give way to flat plains and the hunched bodies of small-statured, brown-skinned men and women picking strawberries beside a line of port-a-potties, provoking peculiar thoughts about crapping in buckets and other unmentionable tangents from a dirty mind in a clean car.

Some time later the flat plains spit up the bones of a skeletal town where broken windows and boarded up houses wearing black sooty coats of highway exhaust crumble into beds of California Poppies that dance an orange jig in the frozen wind.

And I keep driving.

Past low clouds kissing high hills.

Past vivid green expanses and brown-blue ocean.

Past the blight of oil rigs squatting offshore, looking, despite all their monstrous metal and machinery, like fat, evil toads waiting to pounce.

I see the time, 11:11, and reach for my phone. Then I remember. My heart breaks all over again while I abandon my compulsion, stopping my natural inclination to text the letter “x” to the person I love. He’s gone. No kiss for him. No kiss for me. The shock is unnerving. I swallow my pain and drive on.

11:11 was our time, our kissing time, a time to smile and lean closer, to touch noses, lips. A time to send a message or make a call.

The road blurs. I blink.

My mind drifts and I remember our argument about “x’s” and “o’s” and what meant what, and which was which, and if “x’s” were hugs instead of kisses, and if “o’s” were kisses instead of hugs. I recall the friends and strangers we surveyed in our quest for the answer, the laughter, his pantomime acting, the shaking of heads.

He was wrong of course. And I was right. This was not unusual.

An X is a kiss and an O is a hug.

I realize, quite suddenly, that every time he sent an “x” I was being given a hug, not a kiss. I’m perturbed by this new insight into our communication. I feel oddly cheated and let down. I feel as if a million kisses have been stolen from me. Taken back.

I frown and drive on.

Deep canyon walls and gleaming lakes. The smell of wood fires and red clay roads.

And then I arrive.

Ojai, valley of orange groves and aloe plants, rich with the call of native birds and the sound of feasting coyotes.

What the fuck am I doing here?

Why, I’m here to write, of course.

I turn off the engine and smile.

I used to write. I used to write a lot. I wrote about everything that happened to me, the daily minutiae, the ups and downs and highs and lows. Hundreds of people tuned in when I posted online to hear about my sex life, my love life, my boozy escapades and narrow escapes, my darkness and light. And then one day I stopped. I got happy and distracted. I became enmeshed in a loving relationship and kept my stories safe and secret. I got caught up in caring for someone and making a home. I put writing aside. I stopped sharing the ups and downs. I held my cards close to my chest and even, over time, grew to distaste the idea of writing about my life. I became grossed out at all the TMI-ness of it all. The very thought of writing something personal provoked a Pavlovian gagging in my throat.

I haven’t written for a long time.

And here I am, about to share Too Much Information again. Struggling with my loathing of posting intimate details I try to remember how healthy I used to find this process, and how readily people identified with my words. I wonder why? I question everything and yet, in an effort to get out of my own head and move on in life I feel compelled to write and post it. If this is the best I can do before I can get down to writing better things, then so be it.

I am happy to be posting this even as my throat constricts and my stomach churns.

Here goes.

I don’t care what the experts say. It’s not about the details. In hindsight none of the details matter. The “where will we live”, the “when will we have kids”, the “will we get married” questions. None of them are important if you’re lucky enough to find the person you want to spend the rest of your life with. None of it matters, and yet, so often in the midst of trying to move forward in life, those kinds of questions take over. The desire to reach the destination completely overrides the journey. The journey, inevitably, loses it’s lustre. In the last couple of years I’ve spent so much time worrying about my future that I forgot to tend to my present. I lived in dreams and let weeds grow in the garden of my reality.In the shattering aftermath of the relationship I thought would last a lifetime I am left with a slew of regrets.

While it’s true that I have a  warehouse-sized treasure chest full of beautiful jewels and cherished memories, it’s the ugly, stomach-churning regrets that keep surfacing. I look back at the things I wish I had done better and, even though I know I did the best I could with the tools I had at my disposal, I’m painfully aware that the breakup itself has given me a brand new set of tools, and that now I have nowhere to use them. It hurts. I ache to be able to work on this with the person who left me, but he is gone and keeps himself busy building thick walls that seem, from the shadows of their towering height, frighteningly impenetrable.

I think about his family and how much I love them. How badly I want to watch his nephews grow and the Thanksgivings I will miss. I think about the family I wanted to build with him, the kids I wanted to have, the fantasy of it all. I feel the loss of a dream and I mourn imaginary people. Am I crazy?

Break ups. Heartbreak. Loss.

My own personal earthquake in a world already trembling.

From the ruins of it all I contemplate my future while trying to learn from my past. Resentful, angry, hurt and ashamed I force myself to feel positive, hopeful, loving, excited. Sometimes I succeed. I throw myself into exercise. I swing Russian kettle bells and roar and sweat. I work hard. I show up. I distract myself. I enroll in writing classes, writers groups and retreats. I go to therapy and try to accept that “his decision was about him”, not about me. I try to believe the words I hear “he was unable to embrace the things about you that need healing because he has not healed himself”. I try to send love out to him, I try to let go. I cling to the cliff of hope, refusing to let go and fall into the ocean below, an ocean that represents the certainty of life without him. But I know I must. I must let go. The ocean will catch me and I know how to swim. I just have to remember how.

And I have to forgive myself for the way it all played out after he spoke those six knife-like words that changed my own life and ended ours.

“I think I’m wasting your time.”

I wonder what my life right now would look like if I’d behaved with grace and love in the face of that pain and sorrow. I’ll never know.

No one can accuse me of not expressing myself honestly. No one can accuse me of not wearing my heart on my sleeve. Now, knowing that I have an inner Hulk, would anyone dare?

And here I am. Disbelieving, stunned, reeling, depleted. Trying to find a new identity that isn’t enmeshed in “us”.

I am me. Weird, wonderful, scarred, loving, faithful, honest me.

I’m not perfect.

I fuck up.

But I’m human and I try so hard to get it right.

And one day I will.

In the early nineties I discovered a book that changed my life and it wasn’t Little Women. There was nothing demure, ladylike or well-behaved about The Dice Man and that is exactly why I loved it. It was anarchy and it was chaos. It was life on the edge. I read it the same way that I devoured pizza at 3am with a head full of vodka: quickly and with considerable mess. When I finished it I vowed to one day meet the author and buy him a beverage* of his choosing, and, through a series of odd little circumstances, here we are today.

Please enjoy, without further ado, a conversation with George and Zoë.

*No beverages were harmed in the making of this interview.

ZB: I’m not really sure what to call you. George. Luke. Dice Man? George seems the correct approach. Mr Cockcroft does not seem the right one. Although as an Australian with a bawdy sense of humor the name ‘Cockcroft’ does rrroll off the tongue with a certain lascivious panache. ‘Tis a name to be proud of, indeed. I hope you wear it with a flourish.

GC: Yes, the name “Cockcroft” has been a burden and a delight. When one of my nephews married a lovely Chinese woman and changed his last name to “Lyncroft”, I chastised him for cutting off his cock. And that’s not the worst of the puns over the years. Needless to say I have kept my cock except when I abandon it for Rhinehart, but no one ever accused Luke of not having a cock. How the hell did I get into that!?

ZB: I tricked you. I’m good like that. You write under a pseudonym.  Are you ever tempted to use the name Luke Rhinehart to get into restaurants?

GC: Luke Rhinehart may be well-known in some places but not in any restaurants I frequent. Interestingly enough, the owner of a couple of the poshest restaurants  in London  tells  people that he got  into  the  restaurant business by  a casting of a die. But he still made me pay my bill.

ZB: After my experiences with being a Dice person I feel a fondness and respect for dice. In an odd way I almost feel like the dice reciprocate. As a Backgammon player I find that I’m often very lucky with my rolling. Do you play? If so…. do you ever come to San Francisco?

GC: Yes, one does tend to get fond of one’s dice–until they fuck up. However, I never feel they reward me with good rolls for being their disciple. Remember we never know what is good luck and what bad. You win at Backgammon and perhaps that turns out to lead to your doing something that leads to  your breaking your leg in a fall. But is that bad luck? In the hospital you meet this doctor . . . .

ZB: Have you ever wondered what it would be like if we lived in a world where elections were won based on dice determined voting? What sort of Utopia or Hell would this be in your estimation?

GC: If officials of governments were determined by letting chance choose the winner from the candidates that would be a tremendous improvement over our present “democratic” system. It would eliminate the frightening power of money and corporations over who wins elections.

However, to really be effective, the system would have to be changed so that anyone who wants to should be able to put him or her self on the list of candidates for any office, and then chance would choose the winner from among the dozens or hundreds or thousands of candidates for each position. Only in this way would we at last eliminate a government mostly of, by, and for rich old white guys. By letting any citizen be a candidate we could at last have a somewhat multi-class government rather than one dominated by the rich and educated. Blue collar workers, everyday guys, would not have to be represented, they would now hold thousands of offices, depending on the fickleness of Chance. In fact we might actually have representative government: since there are millions more blue collar and lower middle class people in even developed nations, and relatively few multi-millionaires, we would have a government representative of the people rather than a government of millionaires.

And this idea is not as silly as “rational” people think it is. The Greeks, creators of the first democracy, thought it was a swell idea and chose many of their leaders by lot.

But  those in power know that letting chance work in the choosing of office holders means the end of their power. No way it will ever happen.

ZB: The DiceMan changed my life. Or enhanced it. I can’t quite figure out which. I was already VERY liberated as an 18 year old in Sydney, but it certainly added to the mayhem. Drugs, booze, dice, pandemonium. You’re certainly a hero of mine and my cohorts, but not of one particular friend (A.M) who happened to be the victim of some pretty cheeky dice-related shenanigans at 3am one morning. I believe she is owed an apology and, frankly, I refuse to do it as I think you and the dice are completely responsible… what do you have to say to her? And please don’t mention how short she is.

GC: I feel no responsibility for anyone’s dicing except my own, and then only if the dice tell me to. Your tall, lovely friend may be owed an apology but not by me. And not by you. Perhaps Tiger Woods will apologize to her.

ZB: I’ve had to moon The Hells Angels in Kings Cross and bite a bartender on the behind because of some rolls of the die, what is the funniest or most memorably weird thing the dice ever made you do?

GC: Read THE DICE MAN.

ZB: Right. Well, in that case, I hope “Arlene” is getting residuals!

GC: Touché!

ZB: If The Dice Man is “semi-autobiographical” then I’d love some advice from you for myself and other aspiring writers of autobiographical material. I’ve been toying with my own memoir for quite some time but I keep getting caught up in a panic regarding the rather off-color and illicit events that transpired in my teenage years and twenties. Visions of my children reading about mommy taking drugs, or my mother-in-law reading about my sexual exploits certainly put a damper on the joy of the process. I want to be real and true and honest. I want to be brave. People have suggested I write the book in the third person but it doesn’t feel right. Could you expound a little on this sort of problem and then give me a giant kick in the ass? Thank you in advance. And ouch.

GC: I’m surprised, Zoe, that you have any problem with your autobiography. I was lucky enough to write my Ph.D.  dissertation on the obscene American novelist Henry Miller, whose novel THE TROPIC OF CANCER was still not legally published back in the early sixties when I wrote the dissertation. Miller wrote with great exuberance about all aspects of his life, especially the sexual, and never hesitated to reveal the worst things about himself. Had I not had to immerse myself in Miller I would never have had the nerve to write THE DICE MAN.

You have shown  you are free to write about yourself with delightful openness to me and Simon and the readers of the Nervous Breakdown, so why don’t you simply write the book for us. Then if a million people end up reading it, including your children and mother-in-law, you can blame us but laugh all the way to the bank.

I often wondered what my puritan mother would have said if she read THE DICE MAN, but Chance intervened and she died two months after I finished the novel and before it was published. My favorite Aunt read it, however, and then told people she had thrown it in the trash. She still kept me in her will, though.

And your children won’t read your book until they are in their teens at which time having a parent who actually enjoyed and enjoys life they will find very cool indeed. And your mother-in-law will probably take you aside after publication and whisper to you, “Your stories about your wild sex life remind me about when I was seventeen and . . . “

You know full well that we should never sculpt our actions to please others, because we rarely know what will actually and truly please anyone.

ZB: Thank you. I needed that. Have your own children grown up with a fondness for dice? And did they ever try to use the Dice as an excuse for errant behavior? I tried but it didn’t work for me…

GC: A prophet is always without honor in his own family. My children have rarely diced. However, they have been remarkably free without the dice.

I never try to use the dice as an excuse for errant behavior because I guess I don’t recognize “errant” behavior as something that exists. I do many things that I vaguely wish had turned out differently, but I never regret the “decisions” (dice or otherwise) that led to the imperfect results. When I do something that looks like it’s a disaster I can’t help thinking that maybe something good will come out of this. And when things seem to be going swimmingly I wonder what disaster all this good luck is going to lead to.

We never know. Therefore, no regrets, no excuses, no apologies. Roll on. Or Role on.

ZB: I know you get sick of this one, but it’s infuriated me for bloody years. Why has there never been an amazing smash-hit blockbuster movie of The DiceMan, starring a huge star like Brad Pitt or Ed Norton, and directed by an incredible and edgy director?

GC: Chance works in mysterious ways, damn it. But the simple answer is, Can you imagine a Paramount executive making a decision by casting dice? When Paramount hired me in 1986 to write a screenplay of my book, they threw out the script I had already written, one that stayed close to the book, and made me change the story and the characters so that Luke wouldn’t “hurt” his wife and children. They thought an audience wouldn’t sympathize with Luke if he hurt his wife and endangered his kids. They never considered that humans inevitably hurt other humans, even those they love, with dice or without.  So they insisted that the Luke of their film could not be married and couldn’t kill any one or couldn’t “rape” a woman who obviously had the hots for him, and at the end of the film Luke had to see that the dice were evil and repent.

Right. Just the sort of film fans of the book would love to see.

The last screenplay Paramount commissioned (four or five years ago) had NOT A SINGLE CHARACTER OR SCENE FROM THE NOVEL. Hundreds of actors, directors and producers want to make the film but the stodgy studio bureaucracy stands firm.

Alas.

ZB: I lived in Hollywood for many years and also tried my hand at writing and making a film. You probably won’t be surprised to learn that you don’t have to be involved with major studios to get screwed over in that town. Even small Indie crews will bend you over. And they won’t give you a reach-around either.

I digress.

I have a friend who is unable to commit to any decisions until the last minute. This personality trait appears from the outside to throw his life into complete chaos and causes major annoyance to his friends and colleagues. I’ve recommended the dice to him on several occasions but he is seemingly terrified to pick them up. Can you give me a convincing argument to feed him that might help him relax into the experience?

GC: Try bribery.

If  you can’t convince him, Zoe, then no one can. There are thousands of people who read the book or hear about the idea of making decisions by casting a die who can’t let chance make a single decision for them. They may have “moral objections” to giving up their “free will,” or the idea seems too silly and beneath their dignity, or they find a hundred other rationalizations that humans dream up to justify any belief or attitude they have, whether rationalizations rejecting dicing, or rationalizations about what a natural or intelligent thing dicing is to do.

ZB: What is the current view from your window? Feel free to embellish the truth or completely falsify your answer.

GC: I am answering your questions on my laptop computer while here in Vancouver for the Olympic Games. I’m presently sitting on top of the ski jump. When I finish the  interview I plan to cast the dice to see whether it’s me or the laptop that goes flying down the jump, or whether I simply go back to the hotel.

ZB: Fair enough, but if you roll a four you have to come to San Francisco and get drunk with me. Okay?

GC: I’d rather give the odds five out of six: if it rolls a four I won’t come to San Francisco and get drunk with you. Okay?

ZB: Touché.

This interview took place over a series of very pleasant and entertaining email exchanges that caused much smiling and ended far too soon. The interviewer would like to express her gratitude to the interviewee, and to Simon Smithson for introducing the relevant parties. The interviewer would also like to thank Chance, for if she’d rolled a three the whole thing would never have happened.

1. Most cats are smarter than most Americans because most cats like Vegemite.

2. Mothers are always right. Getting orthopedic surgery on a body part on the same day as your partner will make for a really funny (and drugged out) 48 hours. Then the drugs will wear off, whereupon you will discover the futility and pain of trying to have sex with each other and wish you’d listened to both your mothers when they told you that you were completely crazy for scheduling surgery on the same day.

3. Drinking Smooth Move™ tea when you don’t really need to is not a good idea. Drinking two cups is a disaster of leviathan proportions.

4. After witnessing someone throw something wasteful on the ground, particularly a cigarette, it is really fun to chase them down the street and politely say “Excuse me? Excuse me? You dropped something back there.” The offending litterbugs are invariably worried about their iPhone/keys/wallet for about 5 panic-fueled seconds, then really irate/apologetic/apoplectic/embarrassed/amused/abusive. It’s just as much fun to try and guess their reaction beforehand.

5. When handing out your resume at job interviews it helps to have the right phone number included. It’s best to check as soon as you write the resume, and not after an entire year.

6. Sometimes the most counter-intuitive things are the best for us.

7. Crutches suck. There is a reason humans have two legs instead of four.

8. I don’t know what I believe in anymore. Am I an atheist? An agnostic? A Buddhist? A tree-hugging, dice-rolling, naturist?

9. Buying chocolate eclairs earlier in the day in preparation for visitors who will arrive much later is not a wise move. There will be no eclairs. None. And you will want to throw up on your guests. Try not to.

10. Not being able to see Sarah Silverman’s inspired TED talk in which she tries to destabilize the PC world by mentioning the word “retard” over and over again is going to piss me off for quite a while. The fact that TED are not putting it online makes me want to revoke my membership but has resulted in a few good emails to their ‘technical issues’ email address inquiring about “the Sarah problem”.

That’s all. What about you? Anything good?

This year, as we careen towards Christmas like an out of control 18-wheeler, I’ve decided to take my hand off the wheel, lean back with a smile and enjoy the rush of impending doom with a gleam in my eye and a trigger finger on the RECORD button. My foot is off the brakes, kiddies. This puppy is gonna hit and there ain’t nothin’ I can do to stop it.

Knowing that a head on collision with Christmas is in my immediate future I’m choosing to behave in a manner most unexpected of me by friends and family. Instead of shitting on the holiday I’m going to hand it a lollipop and grin at it with unabashed glee as it sucks (and sucks and sucks) and swallows and then, eventually, gives me a sticky pawed high five and trots off on it’s merry way. Ho ho, ho.

This year I’m inviting people over for food. This year I went out of my way to cut out a cardboard tree from an old box and throw some stuff on it. This year I’ve sent presents to family. This year I went to Glide Church and basked in the goodness of some fellow humanitarians. This year I realized that I am, curiously, an actual humanitarian. This year I’m digging deep and finding my jollies. I’m getting my ham on. I’m warming the oven. I’m opening the doors. This year there will be no changing the lyrics of Christmas carols (although ‘Round John Virgin, margarine child; Holy imbecile, tender and mild; Sleep in heavenly peas, slee-eep in heav-en-ly peas’ still makes me feel so lovely and bad). This year there will be Naked Christmas Morning (a new tradition) followed by a gathering of friends for food and laughter. There will be no bah-humbugs, no ‘mehs’, no drunken snarling at the tinsel on the lamp posts. I give up. I give in. I’m happy. It’s nice.

It wasn’t always this easy to give in.

For many years Christmas has embodied all the things I’ve hated with the world. Rampant spending, thoughtless waste and ugly greed in the face of other people’s hunger, despair and despondency. The terrifying amount of discarded packaging and plastic wrappers blowing in the breeze, dying Christmas trees thrown on the sidewalk, electric light-up Joseph’s and Mary’s on the over-watered, under-used front lawns of the sprawling suburbs. The stuff that makes me shudder, the things that slip into my day-mares and drive me quietly mad.

Two years ago, in 2006, I spent Christmas in Orange County. I wasn’t impressed. Then, in 2007, I forgot and did it again. What follows are poetic accounts of both of those Christmases: little ditties I wrote and posted online in an effort to exorcise some of my loathing of the festivities around me, and perhaps, just a little bit, to infect others. Sharing, after all, is caring.

My first poem recalls the true story of the time my boyfriend and I stole an electric light/baby Jesus from someone’s front yard. It’s called-

Stealing Jesus (2007)

T’was two weeks before Christmas, and all through the land,
Pretty lights had been strung up to make life less bland.
And inside the houses all the people were sleeping,
Unaware that two weirdos down their street were a’creeping.

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of consumerism danced in their heads.
And outside in the cold and the dark and the night,
A car stopped in the road and turned off its lights.

A woman emerged as the engine kept running
And crept into a yard with obvious cunning.
She stood there a moment, surveying the scene,
With a grin on her face that was not so serene.

There, in the garden, prayed a family of plastic,
Our criminal knew she must do something drastic.
She looked at the parents, the slumbering child,
She looked back at the car, felt evil, and smiled.

She bent down in the dark and scooped up the prize
Then dashed to the car with panicking eyes,
GO! She screamed at her driver, her partner in crime,
GET OUT OF HERE MAN! WE DON’T HAVE MUCH TIME!

QUICK. FUCK. She yelled loudly. GET US OUT OF HERE!
The driver, still laughing, lurched the car into gear,
HIDE THAT BABY! He cried. GET IT OUT OF MY FACE!!!
AT LEAST ‘TIL WE’RE SURE THAT THEY AREN’T GIVING CHASE!

The car screeched it’s tires and flew out of the hood.
While the plastic baby Jesus slumbered on (as he should).
The kidnappers were proud that they’d been so bold
For what asshole leaves a baby sleeping out in the cold??

FIN.

My second poem is a furious rant at all of humanity and is entitled:

Pick Up Your Shit, You Consumerist Pigs (2006)

T’was the week after Christmas and all over the place
Were the detritus of gifts, discarded- a disgrace.
The children were sleeping, all warm in their beds,
While visions of Playstations danced in their heads;
And my wife in her Gucci, and I in my silk,
Had just settled down for a glass of spiked milk,
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
So I sprang from the chaise to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
I tore open the shutters and looked out at the trash.

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow
Gave the luster of mid-day to the crap left below,
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a big, empty sleigh, and eight steaming reindeer,
I heard a deep voice say “What the fuck is this shit?”,
And I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick!!!

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each heavy hoof.
I drew in my hand, and was just turning ’round,
When down the chimney Santa came with a bound.
He was dressed all in red, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot;

His eyes — how they twinkled! His dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath;
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook, when he moved, like a bowlful of jelly.

He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself;
But a glint in his eye and a tilt to his head,
Soon made me know I had something to dread;
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And destroyed all our gifts; then turned with a jerk,
He frowned with disgust and he wrinkled his nose,
Then, giving a snort, up the chimney he rose;
He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.

And I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
“You’re a curse to this planet, an eyesore, a blight.
Pick up your rubbish you fat, lazy creeps,
Don’t leave it outside in disordered heaps.
I’ve watched you for decades and I’ve had enough,
All you ever want is more and more stuff.
You ask me for this and you beg me for that,
And it’s never been something I made tit-for-tat.
But now I am changing the program, my friends,
And whether or not you get Christmas depends,
On if you can learn to respect your domain,
And stop flushing this world down the proverbial drain.
It’s easy, you humans, it’s just not that hard,
To look at your surroundings and have some regard,
For keeping it beautiful and natural, even,
And then maybe I’ll have something to believe in.
If you can see fit to all band together,
And keep Earth pretty no matter whether,
You pay your taxes and work really long hours,
Or if you think that you’d need superpowers,
To make a big difference these days on this planet,
It’s not true I tell you, even I can see, dammit,
That you’re killing this place for you and your kids,
You may not see it, but you’ve hit the skids.
So be more conscientious.
And a bit less pretentious.
And I might see fit to be here next year,
But only if you help me spread some REAL cheer.”

With that he was gone and I watched him disappear,
And I turned to my wife and said “OMG! Santa was here!”
She just told me to shut up and pass the remote,
While she smeared some more creme on her wrinkly old throat.

The next morning as I got into my Hummer,
I looked at the sidewalks and sighed “What a bummer.
This trash blowing everywhere is so disgusting.
Don’t I pay the council to do the street dusting?”

And I drove to the mall to replace all the gifts,
That Santa had broken, that nasty old shit.
And when I returned my kids were excited,
To see that their Christmas gifts had been righted.

I went to the window and looked to the sky,
“Oh Santa”, I said. “You’re a kooky old guy.
You asked me to do something I’ll never do,
But I got some more shopping done, so really… thank you.”

FIN

And with that I bid you all a happy Christmas.

Don’t forget to recycle! Compost your old ham! Reuse your wrapping paper! Give to the needy! Return your stolen, plastic, light-up babies! You know the drill.

This story begins on a dark and wintry evening and involves death and hormones.

You have been warned.

I was driving home, a passenger in my girlfriend’s car, with a belly full of El Mariachi’s and a head full of girlie-talk. Something mellow and groovy played on the stereo as the backdrop to a lively discussion about life and love and pain and weirdness and all the other good things girls talk about because we can.

Outside the air was cold and dark and crisp. Almost exactly like a burnt potato chip kept in a freezer. But not.

We turned a corner and drove up my street, past old Victorians with curtains drawn and windows darkened, storefronts and lampposts dripping with blinking Christmas lights. It was a very different scene from several hours before when my neighborhood was alive with multitudes of middle aged bourgeois pushing strollers to and fro the Whole Foods market, sipping soy lattes and waiting for the sleek, black Google bus to pick them up and drive them in luxurious, techy glory to their jobs south of the city; Jonahs in the belly of a streamlined whale.

The streets were glistening wet from an earlier rainfall as we approached my house. The music crooned from the speakers and our voices and giggles trailed behind us like happy exhaust fumes in the night. Good times, good times.

But then I saw it. Not a block from my front door. Curled up in the middle of the road, dead. It’s ears clearly visible, it’s body still whole.

A kitten.

My entire being deflated. My heart broke. All sound and joy rushed from my universe in one giant vacuumed slurp.

“Oh, no.”

I can remember distinctly the first time I saw a dead creature on the road. I was about five years old on a road trip with my dad and stepmother. The cat was fluffy, orange and white. There was no blood, no gore, just an empty body on a lonely highway, eyes dulled, ginger fur blowing in the breeze. It was a moment of lost innocence, my first understanding that life can be cruel and fleeting. I cried for a long time, a broken, devastated little girl in the back seat as we groaned and rattled our way along the country roads of New Zealand in our beat up, beat down Combi van.

As an adult, I have long wondered why humans don’t build underpasses into freeways; tunnels that deer, raccoons and other prospective road-kill could use to cross beneath our fearsome, ugly slashes of bitumen. Every time I see a dead animal on the roads and highways a part of me breaks.

Some would call me overly sentimental. I would tell them to go fuck themselves.

We pulled into the driveway. My body was home but my mind was still a block away. I could hear my girlfriend talking but I couldn’t process anything. I was obsessed. I was a five year old girl again, freaking out in that van.

Some platitudes were uttered and I was reassured that life was good. We said goodbye. I was alone. Alone and hormonal.

Nothing good can come from that combination.

I went inside my happy, hippy home and turned on the lights. I sat down on the bed and felt bogged down with heavy stuff. I yearned for some okayness. I wanted this to be different. I wanted someone else to deal with it, to tell me what to do, to make it all better, but my man was away on business; my go-to person was gone.

The five year-old inside me started to panic. “It’s still in one piece. Another car is going to hit it.” My adult brain tried to soothe my five year-old self, but she was having none of it. “We have to get it off the road! What if another little kid sees it? What if the person who it belonged to discovers it when it’s just a stain on the street?” I sat down. I stood up. I calmed myself. I lost it. I found it. I tried to breathe some serenity into my body. I meditated a little, tried to find my inner yoga. I began to compose myself. I imagined some grotesque visuals. I distracted myself. I heard a car go past and thought some gruesome thoughts. Then I picked up my laptop and IM’d my dude.

Me: there is a dad kitten outside on the street and I can’t get it out of my head
dead
it’s in the middle of the road and I wish you were here

Him: aw fuck
im sorry
does he have a collar?

Me: I dunno
it’s a kitten
it’s dark and I don’t want to get too close

Him: aww

Me: what should I do
another car is going to get it

Him: he’s obviously dead?
there’s a city organization for that
they will come get him

Me: who.

Him: i do’t know their name… but you can look it up

Me: I have my period and this is not going well for me

Him: they clean up animal bodies you can try to call SF Animal Control at 650.638.9029

Me: aaaaaaargh.

Him: he’s dead.. there’s nothing you can do. he’s not in his body anymore.
that thing on the street is just matter.
breathe.

Me: k

Him: i love you.

Me: question. I am just assuming the kitten was dead b/c it wasn’t moving when I drove past. what should I do?

Him: you have a few choices re: kitteh
1.. ignore it. if its dead… which it probably is since cats don’t like to sleep in the street… then there is nothing you can do. unless you want to go out there and clean it up…

Me: call me please

I am about eight years old in this photo. The little boy I am towering over is about four. His name is Louis. The 1950’s love-bot next to poor, distraught, little Louis is, indeed, yours truly. For the record Louis did not want to be wearing that frilly dress and bonnet, but I can be very persuasive. Even as a child I had a thing for men in drag.

When I look at this picture I feel profound joy. I smile at those skinny legs, laugh at that proud expression, and am filled with a sense of pride and love for my silly little self. I want to hug me.

There was no adult help in the conception and preparation of this get-up. It was my own creation, my own vision, a vision of a sullen housewife, perhaps, or maybe a haughty hooker. I’m not sure. I have no idea what I was thinking, but I know I loved it. I loved that blond curly wig, those red prostitute heels, that green synthetic monstrosity, those strap-on, plastic, Dolly Parton tits with their enormous pronounced, engorged nipples. I remember the hilarity that ensued whenever I donned that outfit and slunk into a room of adults. I didn’t understand why it was funny, but I loved the reaction.

It sounds like an outrageous statement to make but I’m fairly sure that in the late 1970’s and early ’80’s I had the best dress-up collection of any child on planet Earth.

I was the only daughter of two creatives. A father who dressed like an urban cowboy in constant battle with his own inner Indian, and a mother who was a fashion designer, the founder of Brox Sox (the coolest hosiery company in New Zealand), and the proprietress of a vintage clothing store.

My dress up box was the envy of every girl who ever encountered it, the bane of many a small boy’s existence and the amusement of my mother’s friends. There was never any indication at her soirees that a 1920’s bride, or a clown, or a gorilla would suddenly waltz through the living room. Many a dinner party went happily awry at the unexpected arrival of a princess, bitch, tart, actress, or whatever other slinky little personality I decided to undertake.

The contents of my wardrobe included, but was not limited to:

-Multiple wigs

-Designer gowns dating from the twenties through to the seventies

-Scarves and beads and broaches and bangles

-A silk clown suit

-Many pairs of shoes

-Masks – both glamorous and terrifying

-A full body gorilla suit, including feet

-Hats, capes, cloaks

-Bridal dresses

-Furs and fur stoles, including one with the fox head still attached

-Veils, acres of lace and ribbons and silk

-Negligees, lingerie, slips and petticoats

-Hand-sewn beauties, everything from flowers to handkerchiefs

-A strap-on plastic bosom and matching dimpled ass.

I loved those tits and ass. I still do. I smile fondly as I remember the sense of excitement, daring and masquerade I felt as I tied on those gigantic breasts, donned that curly blond wig, and strapped on my four-inch red hooker-heels. I remember practicing my walk in those heels, a practice that came to serve me well several years later.

This picture is oddly prophetic.

I still love to dress up. I’ve even made a career out of it.

I still love bossing boys around.

I still adore men in drag.

I still love to wear hooker heels, wigs and naughty negligees whenever possible, even when vacuuming.

Not much has changed.

But the more I think about it the more I wonder if my love for dressing-up was somehow tied in to my desire to hasten the process of growing-up. I never liked being little. I never liked being kept in the dark or forbidden to do things because I was too young, too small, too… anything. Being young was prohibitive for me and being grown up seemed like such perfect freedom. Looking back, grown, I love the irony.

The child in this photo had more freedom than she knew.

A little over three years ago a friend of mine in South Florida sent me a Craigslist post from a gentleman in the Los Angeles area seeking writers for a new website. The writers had to fit two criteria. They should be situated on any part of the planet, the weirder and more varied the location the better, and they must be able to write good creative non-fiction. When I received the email I was holed up in a mansion bordering a golf course on the outskirts of Cascais, Portugal with an injured leg and a bored and shitty attitude. I fit the first part of the bill, for I was definitely living in a weird and remote location, but I was no writer, oh no, never would be. Not me.

My friend in Miami pestered, cajoled, threatened and persevered and, one night, tipsy on Beaujolais, I relented and sent off an awkward, self-conscious and self-deprecating letter to the guy who’d posted the ad.

Two days later I got a reply from a dude called Brad Listi. He was a Real Writer with a Real Book, and A Blog, and Ambition, and Motivation, and Credibility, and he said something that changed my life forever.

He liked my work.

It’s amazing what a little approval can do.

For years I had been writing stories, letters, poems and weirdness, but sharing them only with friends and family. When my friends and family complimented my words, praised me or urged me to write more I filed their encouragement away as biased love and white lies. I simply didn’t believe anyone. Not a single damn soul. I never showed my work to anyone but my closest circle. I couldn’t. I didn’t dare. And now, thanks to a push from a friend on the other side of the world and three glasses of French red grape-juice, here I was on the receiving end of some surprising encouragement from a total stranger.

The weirdest thing?

I believed him immediately.

I suddenly felt capable. Wow. Perhaps I can do this. Perhaps I really can do the one thing I’ve always wanted to do but never had the courage to. Holy shit?!

My entire life changed in an instant.

Mr Listi urged me to join Myspace to practice my writing and garner an audience that I could then sway to the website when it finally opened. Reluctantly I did. My life changed again. My blog became popular, my readers grew, and grew hungry. I wrote and wrote and wrote and shared EVERYTHING with anybody who’d read it. I got the idea for a movie about it. I wrote it, I filmed it, and I even put Brad Listi in it. But that’s another story.

I met a bunch of people from Myspace who read my blog and became friends with many of them. But that’s another story too.

Finally, through a series of strange and beautiful adventures and encounters, I met a man on Venice Beach who I’d only ever spoken to through emails and one brief phone call. He was the close friend of an amazing and luminous woman I met in the comment section of Brad’s blog. Her name is Solar and she is a great light in my life. This man and I went for a walk on the beach where I picked up a bee and he hugged me and then, a couple of months later, we fell in love and moved to San Francisco where, after a series of malfunctions, we ended up sharing a house and a vegetable garden and a lot of beautiful dreams. But that, again, is another longer, prettier tale.

So happy birthday, thenervousbreakdown.com. Thank you for all the doors you’ve opened and the magic you’ve made happen. I love you very much and I think you’re wonderful.

-ZB

In 1988 I was fourteen years old, five-foot-nine, skinny, flat-chested and at least four more years away from any proper evidence of puberty. To compound all of this luminous adolescent joy I was also morbidly shy and horrifically self-conscious. In short, I was a child. A bloody tall child, but a child nonetheless.

My hair was long and brown, my eyebrows heavy, my cheeks full. I was so thin, and so tormented by my thinness, that I ate as much as I could to try and gain weight. I ate all sorts of crap. Nothing happened. I remained, despite all efforts, a wisp of skin and bones, stumbling when I ran, blown hither and thither by gusts of strong wind and glances from strangers. The sad truth is that I come from a family of stick insects, and the physique I would later be grateful for was a thing of shame and sadness in my formative years. Victimized and scorned, I was teased mercilessly about my stature by other children. My nicknames were, amongst others: Olive Oyl, Bean Pole, Stick, Twig, and, my personal favorite, Inverted, a name given to me by the boys in my neighborhood in honor of my invisible breasts. Humiliated by my non-existent chest, I covered my body as much as I could and engaged, whenever possible, in the bust-increasing exercises I read about in Judy Bloom books.

These were not my glory days.

As an only child growing up without television I sought solace in books and art. I wrote and drew and ate up words and pictures with my heart and mind and soul. Aesthetics and language nourished me. I wanted to be an architect, an artist, a writer, a filmmaker, a designer of things. I had dreams and ambitions that most parents would be proud of, at least any parents with artistic persuasions.

But then something happened, something my mother had known was going to happen for some time, something she allowed but didn’t necessarily want, something my father had dreaded and detested, and something I would never have expected.

Boom!

They came a-calling.

Model agents are a curious bunch—always on the lookout for young girls they can take on and “protect” and “nurture” while at the same time pushing them into a hyper-sexualized and shallow world where they will earn money for being blessed with good looks, without having to use their brains or their creativity, and where they will be rewarded for being a glorified clothes hanger who knows how to work a camera (and maybe, if they’re really good, a room).

These agents I speak of have eyes and instincts that can see beyond the shyness, the scrawny exterior and inverted bosom. They have minds that add the numbers, do the math, envision the war paint and see, through slitted eyes, the finished product.

Click. Whir. Click.

The photographer who shot my mother’s loft for a spread in Vogue Living requested to take a picture of me as I skulked in the corner in my ill-fitting, unflattering, blue-and-white checked school uniform, with ink stains on my fingertips, a snarl upon my youthful lips, and daggers in my diamond-eyes.

A vicious little virgin was I.

She took the photo and, when she left, took it with her, changing my life in an instant in ways I will never be able to digest without feeling a cocktail of conflicting emotions.

Tick-tock.

The phone rang.

Will you come down and see us?

My mother, reticent but loving, conversed with me as she would an adult. Her first mistake.

In a matter of hours we were sitting in an agency. This was nothing very new to my mother. As a designer and semi-retired fashion icon herself, she was clued in to the scene. But, as a disciplinarian, she was a tad… elastic. Either that or I was an uncontrollable hellion, given an inch and greedily taking a hundred miles.

Conversations were had. Things discussed and mulled over. The nice people who wanted to represent me were comfortable with the restrictions my mother placed on the arrangement.

I could only work on weekends, in Melbourne, and only, only, ONLY if it was a high-profile or high paying job. Considering that the majority of all modeling/fashion industry work in Australia stemmed out of Sydney this seemed like a perfectly tight arrangement. Enough to keep me quarantined while also allowing me to feel special—something a gangly girl in the art department with a funny, foreign accent had a hard time feeling in a school full of righteous upper-middle-class bitches with a knack for cruelty.

Unfortunately for my mother (and my ego), something else happened that changed the course of our lives.

I booked a job.

Two days after that first meeting we got the call.

Vogue magazine was flying their entire crew down from Sydney to work with me on an eight-page editorial. Over the weekend.

BAM.

Poor Mum.

I was off and posing, and nothing in my world would ever be the same again. Over the next few years my grades would suffer, my ego would soar, my belligerence double. By 15, I would be living in Tokyo alone over the holidays; by 16, in Paris and Milan. I would leave school. I would be hit on by vile cretins, assuming me to be stupid or willing to advance my career with sexual favors. I would be punished with no work when I didn’t play the game. I would see strange things, do even stranger things and sometimes even do strangers. I would meet wonderful people and terrible assholes. I would make lots of money and spend it all. I would look like a young girl but live like a woman while I behaved like a princess and partied like a devil. I would move on and on, traveling for the better part of twelve years, never finding a home but always seeking one. Eventually I would find it in America in the least likely of places. But that’s another story. At this point my life was still a vague, uncertain, exciting future, and I was just a kid with dreams. And, two months later, when my first editorial in Vogue hit the stands, I looked like a prepubescent, innocent, wide-eyed virgin-child caught playing dress-ups in her mother’s most expensive evening gowns and stiletto-heeled shoes.

It’s an ugly reality that those pictures appeared in a magazine targeted towards 35-to-40-year-old women, and higher. This magazine became one of my regular clients and frequently used me to sell clothes, style and a physical ideal to middle-aged women more than twice my age. Even as a kid I thought this was weird and somehow inappropriate. I didn’t understand it but nor did I question it, and I still willingly danced with and followed the piper, for he played a most enticing and seductive tune.

It’s a strange, strange world, and we’re in it.

Recently I was asked what I wanted.

Not what I wanted in my tea or what I wanted on my salad, but what I wanted out of life.

Ugh.

This seemingly innocuous little query dredged up tumultuous feelings inside, forcing me to realize that-

A) the things I’ve always wanted had, while I wasn’t paying attention, morphed into something
different, and

B) that I needed to have a serious rethink before I could answer definitively.

I opened a bottle of wine and had a good chug from the neck. Clarification often accompanies a good Cabernet.

There I sat, glass beside me, “writing it out”.

What do you want, ZB? I asked myself. The answer was surprising.

If I’m going to be honest with you, and myself, I’ll have to admit that I used to want wealth, fame and glory, an ugly remnant of growing up in the spotlight surrounded by people with big dreams and big lives. Teenage dreams are hard to let go of sometimes, especially when they still seem within reach.

I used to want a life filled with expensive, minimalist things and easy opportunities for adventures and madness.

I used to want an eternity of sex, drugs and rock and roll.

I used to want my days to be filled with private jets, high-budget catering and make-up artists who would satisfy my craving for fuller lips by drawing mine bigger. I wanted photographers to tell me I was beautiful and designers to keep giving me their clothes. I needed those things to feel valuable and alive.

And now?

I still want the adventures and the eternity of sex and rock and roll, only now I want less casual sex with much more love in it, and even louder music.

That’s a relief.

So what HAS changed?

A lot.

Now I want babies and security and love and simplicity- I want a family, something that, despite all my beautiful relatives and their unconditional love, I never felt I had. Now I have to write to feel worthy. Now I have to create in order to feel alive. Now I have to be present to feel beautiful. All I have to do is show up.

My how things change.

The thing is, if I were to really consider it, I’ve already had a pretty big life.

I’ve been to every continent (except the frozen one).
I’ve loved and I’ve lost, many times over.
I’ve experienced death, depression, disaster.

I’ve hit rock bottom and seared my wings against the sun.
I’ve done the most glamorous things and the most sordid.
I’ve cat-walked all over the world, shot covers for Elle, been photographed for Vogue, and been forcibly ejected from the most gruesome dens of iniquity between Hong Kong and Manhattan.
I’ve lived the high life and licked the underbelly.
I’ve amused people and offended others.
I’ve been a brat and a belle.

I’ve stayed in castles and squatted in shacks.
I’ve partied with presidents, skinny dipped with rock stars, discussed architecture-politics-urination-sexual proclivities and literature with celebrated thinkers, and committed petty ‘crimes’ with unexpected celebrities.
I’ve traveled with dear friends and nursed them through madness.
I’ve done lots of crazy shit and blah blah blah seen things that would make my poor mothers hair curl if I wrote it here.

In short, I’ve lived, but I’ve never done anything, no matter how debauched, for any kind of personal gain or anything without honor and good intent.

I might be twisted, but I’m not bent.

I know for absolute certain that the life I’ve lived since I was thirteen years of age would not and could not have happened had I not been modeling. It’s a fact.

My first foray into the inner sanctum of the fashion industry was in the late 80’s, at a time when the catering budget was higher than the collective wages of the entire crew, and a time when nobody was eating. They couldn’t, their noses were too full.

I was young. So young.

And so impressionable.

The times were decadent, destructive and delicious. High camp ruled the social scene and air kisses were often a prelude to hasty sex in darkened corners. It was an irresponsible time. AIDS had made it’s appearance and we were, unknowingly, about to lose several of our finest, maddest and most creative. It would take a long time for us to slow down and grow up. We all thought we were invincible. I know I did.

The fashion industry is a strange place to grow up in. But, like anything, it is what you make of it. For me it was a hard road of misadventure and madness… a road that has come full circle and is now winding through gentler pastures with more creative scenery.

It’s pretty.

I like it.

Perhaps I’ll send you a postcard.

For the last couple of years I’ve struggled with my identity as A Writer. My once daily passion has become, at times, a chore, an onus. My dear old friend now wears an ugly hat and is rarely invited in to visit.

In an effort to change the Pavlovian responses I feel towards something that used to bring me a greater high then any drug or alcohol, and brought me more joy than the company of most people, I’ve begun to give myself exercises in writing and, much to my timid excitement, they appear to be working. Words are appearing on the screen and my face, as I type those words, seems to be smiling.

EXERCISE 1: Have a friend give you a sentence or paragraph. The weirder and more lateral the better. Read that sentence and start writing. Don’t think too much about it.

I was surprised to find a mural of the Apollo theater in his bathroom. I’d snuck away from the party when I figured no one would notice, hoping to find a quiet place to snort some coke. The knowledge of the foil wrapped gram inside my pocket was burning a hole in my brain and the intensity of the company I was keeping was decimating my confidence. I needed a pick me up, some powdered personality, a snort of self-assurance. There’s nothing worse than a room full of Nobel Laureates to intimidate the crap out of me.

Our host was a small man, forty-something, bald. His nose bulbed and flowered at the end like a strange red fruit. He’d caught me staring earlier and I’d been mortified by the look in his eyes as he accessed my brain and read my thoughts. I felt obvious. What was I doing here anyway? Why me? And where the fuck was Sylvia?

Sylvia was my girlfriend. Kind of. We’d been dating for about six months. We went to parties, screwed a lot, ate expensive food and took expensive drugs. She gave great head and liked to give it. Anywhere.

And so we went everywhere.

I took her to ball games, the park, movies, to visit my parents, Saks Fifth Avenue…. my old school. She blew me in different locations as if she was checking off a to-do list of urgent things she had to do, and places she had to do them, before she died… if she wanted to get in to heaven.

I wanted a blow-job now. A blow job, and a line of blow. I looked around, a cursory kind of look, expecting to find her nearby, but the room was too full, the people too colorful. Huge palms and brocade draperies obscured parts of the room.

I frowned. No sign of her. I took the nearest exit, a dark paneled hallway, and made for the bathroom. It was unlocked. I entered. It was a sight to behold. The walls had been painted to look like an over-sized replica of the Apollo. I was dwarfed by the scale of the neon sign, overwhelmed by the immensity of the scope, and baffled by the notion that anyone would want this kind of kitsch weirdness on the wall of their john. But that wasn’t all. It was the sight of our host going down on Cynthia while she leaned back against the towel rail that really threw me.

Our eyes met.

“Ah fuck” I said, taking the aluminum wrapped powder out of my pants pocket, opened it and tipped a hearty pile onto the marble topped counter. You just can’t win ‘em all, I thought, as I bent over and inhaled.

EXERCISE 2: Pick a word you love and imagine that you have to convince other people to love it. Put that word in a story or essay.

It’s my favorite time of day.

Well. That’s a lie. I don’t really have favorite anythings, but, right this second, as I type, it’s a time of day that has a special name, and definitely a special magic about it.

It’s the time of the day just after dusk and right before twilight.

It’s called…. The Gloaming.

The Gloaming is when magic happens. Fireflies awaken and fairies stir in the gnarled boughs of ancient oaks. Younger children are tucked into warm beds while their brothers and sisters are allowed to read on for ten more minutes, and couples throw matches into bunches of dry kindling, then snuggle on rugs while the flames flicker and groove.

The Gloaming is a time when life changes. The stars appear to be closer, the earth further away. The Gloaming is the world you see when you look into a mirror and everything seems better, different, more alive.

The Gloaming calls for bottles of fine wine to be uncorked and friends to gather around kitchens, clamoring for more food, more drink, more conversation. It is the few allotted minutes of the last hour before darkness.

As I type the darkness grows, the shadows become deeper and the last threads of the torn fabric that made up this afternoon are ushered into the realms of memory.

The Gloaming is now over.

Good night.

EXERCISE 3: Pick a moment in your life that made you FEEL a great deal of STUFF. Write a brief story of predetermined length that includes as many visual references to Place and Feeling.

“You’re the most romantic sumbitch I’ve ever met in my life.” She said.

He smiled at her fondly. “This is the seventeenth goodbye we’ve said in the last two months. Aren’t you ever going to bloody leave?”

Laughing, she conceded.

“Melted, I drip away.”

The last embrace, the last pang, the last desperate effort to burn the imprint of his skin to hers, and then nothing. They parted ways the final time.

The taxi pulled away, a yellow beast in a black night, and the rain came down like a gift from above. Wet streets and tear-stained cheeks mirrored the lights from tall buildings.

Flickering images in her brain played back the story of her last adventure… the touches, the music, the song sweetly sung in a sacred moment in a stolen bedroom in a loft in Nolita. Fingers on her back, playing in her hair. Tenderness and love and loss and the giving away of need.

Tears rolled. Involuntarily.

Bathroom passions, silent laughter. Shhhh! Giggle.

The taxi drove on.

In the darkness something shifted, deep inside a sadness lifted, a hurt stopped aching.

A smile spread over wet cheeks and a frantic, beating heart filled with peace.

He was right, and she knew it. They had done New York.

Before the dawn she would be gone, knowing that the sun would rise on a different world for her, and that everything was possible.

Lastly, remember that, in the words of the very prolific Stephen King, writers write. So don’t stop. As hard and repellent and demoralizing and disgusting as it might be today, tomorrow it might suddenly seem sweeter than a mainlined bag of saccharine in the vein of a diabetic.

Just keep on truckin’.