Author Archives: parmanifesto

July 4th

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In the summer in Wisconsin, everyone goes the same direction for vacation: Up North. Unfortunately, they also do it at the same time (July 4th weekend), use the same freeway, the same rest stop, the same drive-thru – places that remind us we are only civilized if it’s convenient. It’s enough to convince even the most amicable pacifist that there is definitely an overpopulation problem, and he must do his part by buying a deer rifle and shooting just a few random people.

Some of whom may be relatives.

Some of whom may be my Grandpa, who insists that we enter the McDonald’s drive-thru with an SUV and a trailer. I am not a prophet, but I could foresee a problem with this idea.

We place our order and begin to make the first turn. The left rear wheel squeaks against the curb, as if to say, “remember us, back here? We’re holding up a gigantic trailer attached to your ass.” I smile and nod, sweating.

Now comes the second turn. If you’re visualizing a plotline, this is the climax. The left rear wheel bumps into the curb and doesn’t apologize. The curb refuses to move. So does the wheel. We are just 10 feet from the first window. I realize there is a long line of cars behind us, filled with people who are licking their lips – not for a burger, but for a riot.

And here I am, a 500 pound bride with a 500 yard train, trying to walk down a 5 inch aisle. There will be no honeymoon at the end. I begin to panic.

Grandpa, who suggested this disaster, starts offering directions – “turn the wheel right” “no, the other right” “can you pull forward?” After a few delightful minutes of this, the drive thru employee pops out of the first window like one of the villagers in Beauty in the Beast and enthusiastically declares that I can just pull up to the second window. I spew lava at her, and she pops back in.

Then God intervenes and negotiates a compromise between the wheel and the curb, which they seal with a screeching scuffle.

Flushed with freedom, I do not even drive to the first window; I flatten the gas pedal and aim for the far end of the parking lot, but nowhere on earth will be far enough. There is an outcry of indignant disbelief from the relatives, which I silence by spewing more lava. I hand some money to one of them, which she carefully accepts like it’s a crystal figurine. Then she’s gracefully walking in the drive thru, allowing herself to be an ironic punch line for the sake of sanity.

The car is quiet. The trailer is quiet. Grandpa is quiet. We are all quiet. Waiting for peace to appear in our hearts.

But instead of peace, I receive conviction, which almost always comes in the quiet. I remember, again, that Grandpa can hardly do anything himself. He needs a cane, he needs medication…but he needs to do things. He asks us to do them, so he feels like he’s doing them. Love is not independent.

Strike a Pose

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“Be quiet, we don’t want to be caught,” the photographer instructs me. He turns to the roof ladder, and leaps up it like a monkey firefighter.

I try not to replay the opening scene in Vertigo. I’m a nervous matchmaker, introducing my right foot to the first rung, hoping they will like one another. They do. The same with the left. Soon both feet are social climbers, leading me to the roof.

The photographer is waiting, and the wind, sunlight and temperature are behaving like his crew – submitting to the moment.

“Now, put on the first outfit,” he says, demonstrating how a whisper can be a command.

“All right,” I say, looking through the outfits. They are overpowering; they are overdone; they are just over. But he’s a friend, so I put them on. Like Ben Folds, I do the best imitation of myself.

Soon he is telling me to do things I don’t do anymore, while making it look like I do…”give me a cocky pose.” I do. “No, like this.” He does it. I do it. “Umm, not quite, here, mirror me.” He does it. I do it. “No, come stand where I’m standing.” He does it. I do it. click. “Done. Next outfit.”

Years ago I saw Paris is Burning, a documentary about vogue balls in New York City. The participants try to pass for their opposite gender or social class. All I know is they walked down that runway like they were walking away from their old selves.

Turbulence

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It’s a short flight. I am just waking up from a nap, feeling that familiar whiplash caused by sleeping in a position other than supine. I creak and crank my head to the side to face my friend across the aisle. Her eyes are widening like two puddles of spilled milk.

“How have you been sleeping through this?” She accuses me, gripping the armrests as though they are her children and she is terrified of losing them in the terror. The plane, concerned that I might question the validity of her angst, obligingly rushes the bad weather like a bull, jabbing, wobbling, plunging.

Suddenly the entire preceding week seems worthy of only a garbage disposal. The woman in front of us begins wailing like some caricature version of herself. The flight attendants careen down the aisle, attempting to cloak their naked fear with calm faces. We are going to die. They know it. I know it.

We are praying now. Frightened prayers, humble prayers, angry prayers, genuine prayers. Without ceasing.

And then…the tires grip the pavement. The seat belt light goes off. Everyone gets up. Grabbing at bags. Gabbing into cell phones. Cutting in line. Cramming through doorways.

It is early morning, and the sun is shining.

Upper & Lower

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I call it my office. I don’t call it my bedroom. It’s not big enough for either.

My bed is lofted about 5’4″. If the Brewers decided to play baseball on the floor, the bed would be the nosebleed section. Upstairs I can hear the landlord and his lady pounding the keys of their sexual organs. My roommates bring their boyfriends home, shut their doors, and – gIGGle – shhhh – gIGGle – shhh.

God’s going to use my gonads for his glory, not for my gratification.

The conventional diagnosis for this is sexual frustration, but I prefer sexual circumvention – rerouting the passion for a more productive use.

I am a string figure in God’s hands. He knows that being in a relationship would distract me from being an artist, so he allowed Satan to make me selfish. He knows that without a struggle I would be without inspiration, so he allowed Satan to make me homosexual.

Today a co-worker held up a cable and said, “see? This is a male to male connection.” Inside, I was a studio audience, and Satan was Lucille Ball.

I laughed my ass off.

Divorce Court

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I sit here. An only child. Satan and God are battling for custody. I have two daddies! But they are not together. They have never been together.

I sit staring straight ahead, but my concentration has the strength of a dead dandelion. One suggestive exhale and the seeds of doubt loosen and drift, land and root.

Satan’s outfit is a scientific study of cool. Classification: self-consciously careless. The tight tailored black pants with extra length that gathers around the boot. The oxford shirt with the sleeves rolled up. The slicked-back hair with a few strands falling forward. Some would say he’s always closing a deal; he would say he’s always “gaining agreement.”  He walks to my side, gently curls the hair behind my ear and speaks softly into it. The words are fur handcuffs – individuality, dignity,  rights – that seem sexy, until you can’t squeeze out of them.  He places his hands on my shoulders, his body leaning into my back. The body heat is a current – natural, justifiable, persuasive – that makes me lean back into him.

God’s outfit? Even in the early ’90’s, in Seattle, it wouldn’t have been cool. Shapeless robe stitched of rags. Unshaven. Hair to His waist. Clean, though. And those eyes – the warmth and danger of glowing coals. I have a lot of time to look into those eyes, because they’re always looking at me. He doesn’t talk nearly as much as Satan; when He does it’s clearer, but more confusing. The words are ropes – submission, humility, self-denial – that bind and strengthen. He stands and opens His arms to me. The posture is a cross – humiliating, absolute, restorative – that draws me to Him.

I look for a judge, a jury, a door – there are none. Then I remember. The three of us have always been here. We will always be here. And my choice changes by the moment.

Grace Cathedral

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“Suggested donation $10,” the box solicits through its slit of a mouth. I stuff a 10 in there, just to shut it up, and enter the sanctuary.

My mind is a mass of arrows pointing inward: I’m such a career woman in my sweater with shoulder pads! And it cushions the strap of my bag. Double-duty fashion. These pews are like Victorian British women – so stoic and stiff. I’m going to sit on one of them. Is it sacrilegious that I’m coming to this church only because Vince Guaraldi once performed here? Not nearly as sacrilegious as that gay man taking a picture of his boyfriend praying. Are they joking or serious? Am I enraged or envious?

But the arrows multiply and overlap and fade – like the opening credits of Charade – and I am silent. Silent under these canopies of stone, these glowing embers of stained glass.

Organ chords emerge, as if from the earth’s core. The choir enters. “Shield the joyous,” they sing. Every voice is a ribbon, swirling through the room, encircling hearts and suspending them. Suddenly a small crowd of tears gathers in my eyes, confused, overcome; we all look to the altar. God? What would you have me be? What would you have me do?

But I close my eyes, and the crowd disperses. Go home now. There’s nothing to see here.

It's Always Friday Night

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I’m listening to the phone with my left ear when it whispers in my right ear.

Pssssssst.

That wet worst-kept secret we normally do in a toilet? There’s a guy doing it off a balcony. Just out of range, thank every god of every religion. I tell my phone companion; he isn’t offended: “Of course, I’ve done it before. Stroll to the edge, check for pedestrians, unzip the pants, look at the moon and take a leak.”

“I’ve never done it.”

I haven’t.

But I have pissed on a Staten Island street corner. It was 3am. No one was around. Urgent burn dissolving into dreamy relief.

“Are you enjoying yourself this evening?” I ask.

“Oh, hmmm, well…” his voice sounds like a feather boa, coquettish, ticklish.

The cold makes my muscles marble, then makes them throb. I wish I was indoors, drinking with him. Or just indoors. Or just drinking. Alcohol is a good criminal defense lawyer that represents us to ourselves as misunderstood, well-intentioned, promising. We are just fine, we have always been fine, we will always be fine. It’s a life sentence.

“I worry about you,” I say.

“Don’t worry, pray.”

“All right.”

To the Birthday Girl

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“Hello, friend.” She says, and suddenly her soul reaches into mine, gropes around for the naked mole rat of insecurity, snatches it with swift tenderness, bathes it, dabs it with cologne, and wraps it in a fur coat before returning it.

This is a customary greeting, and yet I can’t recover from it any quicker now than from the first time I met her. So I look into her eyes, like those of a vintage Italian Barbie, only infinitely more beautiful and friendly. They’re always mid-wink – perhaps her eyelids are trying to shield me from the blinding light within. (Isn’t that an inedible sentiment.) Or maybe she just smiles a lot.

“Everyone was hoping you’d get here soon,” she says, squeezing my arm like she’s taking my blood pressure. We’re in front of her friends, many of whom I wouldn’t like if she didn’t like them. She is transfixed by them, as though they are beautiful phenomena. I find myself appreciating people through her. I turn to ask her a question but she is gone. I look around the room. There she is. By the front door, introducing herself to someone. They’re lucky, I think. We all are.

Irate

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“I think I have a talent for living. Perhaps I’m trying to make the most of something small for want of something better, but I think a true talent for living has the quality of creation, and if that’s the talent I was meant to have, I’m awfully glad I have it. I’d rather live a first-rate life than paint a second-rate picture.” -Samuel Taylor, Sabrina Fair

I read this line and the letters are clothes warm from the dryer, clinging and comforting: You can have a first-rate life. Then they are little jurors, pointing their serifs at me, with inquiry and suspicion: Why can’t you paint a second-rate picture? Then they are little forks in the road, poking and insisting, You can only do one.

If you have a career, a relationship, travel – there’s no time for anything else. If you write, perform, create – there’s no money for anything else. So I’m working part-time and writing part-time and the whole thing is a very tall and poorly constructed wedding cake with too many layers – leaning this way and that. How can I keep it together. Who’s going to eat it. I’m not even married.

Just last night, on a family video, I saw this fiendish red-faced red-headed boy, flailing a naked Barbie by the hair. He was intimate with his imagination. Barbie was an actress in his film, a backup singer in his concert, a character in his novel. He made it look so easy. I wanted to be him again.

Who are you, Emily Sue?

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You are the creator and caretaker of fantasies.

The children know this; they cling to the bottom of your feet like wet grass, wanting to go where you go. You take them to England, Austria, Neverland. Everyone is expected to bring something unique but equal. No one is left out unless they choose to leave.

I miss you while you’re gone. I begin to feel like Hayley Mills in The Parent Trap. Do I have a sister, or is it all split screen gimmickry? How much longer can we be separated and be complete? When is our next late night phone call?

At the end of the journey, you and the children produce an animated scrapbook. We, the family, friends, neighbors, acquaintances, gather around and laugh, stare, gasp, sigh. We didn’t know it would be like this. We didn’t. Why did we doubt your loyalty, or sanity? You’ve been somewhere. You’ve become something. And we missed it again. Or maybe we just saw the best moments.