Old and Frumpy

This weekend I found out that I am the oldest employee at the store where I work. This is a new thing for me; I'm only 29, for christssake! My manager is 23. When I was 23, I had just moved to California and was working 15 hours a week putting books away at a library. That was in 2000 pay, too. I bet this new manager of mine makes just a little more per hour now than I did at the library back then. Library gigs are a good deal if you can find one. I'd way rather work at a library than manage a woman's apparel store.

So I'm amused and a little shaken about being the oldest gal at my job, but I'm not bitter. I'm always looking for my way out. I'm no retail lifer. Retail kind of sucks. It's so demeaning. People ask me questions about our product line all of the time, and I try to answer the best I can because when I am a customer, I value good service. But lately I have begun to resent questions because I don't care. Why should I devote my brainpower to learning about properties of performance fabrics like Tactel and Lycel? I have other things to worry about, like finding a better job that pays me enough to afford groceries.

Yesterday a woman came in asking if we had rash guards. Fuck if I knew what a rash guard is. "Rash guard?" I asked her. She motioned around her shoulders, like she was brushing off a rash. "Um, we do have Bodyglide," I said. "To prevent chafing." Bodyglide comes in a stick like deoderant and you slick it all over yourself before a long run or hike. It really does work. I used to use Vaseline, but Bodyglide is better.

The woman gave me an odd look. "No, that's not what I need," she said, and she walked away. Later I round out that a rash guard is a tight top to wear when you surf of boogie board or whatever. Hey man, I don't surf! How am I supposed to know that!? Turns out we did carry rash guards, but since we receive like two minutes of training, how was I supposed to know? I felt embarassed for what I'd said to the woman, who must have thought I was nuts. Now I just think it's funny. But if I went into a store asking for, say, a paring knife and the clerk offered me a can opener, I'd likewise roll my eyes. The rash guard woman can think I'm an idiot, but the truth is I'm super smart because I *don't* know what a rash guard is. I'm smart because I'm training myself not to care about retail crap.

The store is supposed to sell workout wear, but in truth we don't. The store used to sell workout wear, but now all they sell is overpriced yoga wear and leisurewear made out of this fleecy stuff called Cashmore. It's super soft and cuddly, the kind of thing you'd want to wear if you stayed home sick from work. Cashmore separates are basically like really expensive sweatsuits. They come in colors like Celadon, Powder, Periwinkle, Cotton Candy, and Creamsicle. It's soft, fuzzy, and baggy like an Easter Bunny costume. Very frumpy.

My new mission is to dress foxy for work. It is the one way I can rebel against Cashmore Frump. I used to make an effort to wear outfits that looked like I might have bought them at the store, but no more. I don't have any clothes like that anyway. I'm wearing my fitted jeans and hipster tops and shit like that. None of those ass-ugly sandal-tennies or drawstring capris. I'd rather look hoochie-mamma than frumpy. I may be 29, but I ain't old and lazy.

Sandy Sawbuck

This space has been very useful for complaining about my crummy retail job. I am a huge baby and I exaggerate; the job is not that bad. It started out as seasonal, which was fine for both parties. But after Christmas came and went, no other job opportunities revealed themselves to me, and the store still needed help. So I stayed on and became a permanent part-time employee.

This means that I now have no clear escape in sight, like I did when I was a temp. I see these prime years of my life goign down the drain as I spend my days adding customers to our mailing list and straightening bra tops on hangers. The clothes at the place make me sick now. They are so lame, so Bay Area Mom. I have to wear a small or extra-small in most of them, and lemme tell you--I'm thin, but I ain't no extra-small. Spending so much time around casual, baggy pastel clothing makes me wanna revert back to my black denim and motorcycle boot mode of attire, but that would kind of stick out. So I wear the few baggy, shapeless, unstained and unholed clothing items in my closet over and over again. I have, like, one work outfit because everything else is too dressy (?!)

Some of the women I work with get to me as well. I like working with men, who may be just as sensetive, but they cover it up with cussing and crude jokes. My catty nature is rising up at this all-woman clothing retail job, and I don't like it. I'm trying to be more zen.

However, I have made some work friends who feel just as I do about the retail life. This helps a lot. One of these people is Leslie, who is also keenly aware of the time and talent that Fat Woman Fleece is sucking from her vitality. Yesterday we were both off, and we took her chocolate lab Hannah to the Bulb for a romp in the frothy chemical stew that is the Bay. Standing there on the little strip of beach behind the horse track, I noticed a slip of green sticking up from the sand. A ten dollar bill! It made our day--well, no, not really. But is was a nice bonus. After touring the Bulb we went to this coffee place down the block from my apartment and were big spenders. I got a 12-ounce latte instead of an 8-ounce latte, and I tipped a whole dollar instead of my usual 50 cents (and that's only if I have change). Yes, we were riding high, sipping grandiose coffee drinks and talking about what the hell we should do with ourselves and our mangled careers.

I wonder who dropped that $10 bill in the sand? Why would anyone have their wallet out at the Bulb, anyway? There's nothing to buy there, which is why the place is so special and fun. Bulb entertainment is free: the spectacle of nature's bottom-feeders taking over mankind's industrial flotsam. Well, whoever you are, person, I hope you had 10 bucks to spare.

The Most Wonderful Sound

Yesterday I walked to work. This is what I do for excersie on days when I don't have time to go on a run. It's a whopping 2-mile walk--maybe less than that. My pedometer is broken, so who really knows how long it is. If I book it, I can get to work in about 20 minutes. Usually I don't book it; yesterday, for instance, I was groggy and a wee bit hungover, and I'd stopped at a bakery for a latte and a scone. So I ambled along in the Sunday sun, nibbling my scone and gulping down my latte. (I have no illusions about lattes. They are, for all practical purposes, warm milkshales for adults).

My walk takes me past little Berkeley houses, the kind that cost half a million bucks and look delapidated and semi-trashy from the outside. I figure mot of these homeowners have lived there for decades, and they don't feel any irony in their stockpiling of broken chairs or splintered palets in their tiny front yards.

But at least they are green front yards, with trees around and fairly little automobile traffic. It's a nice little walk. I rounded a corner and heard the wonderful sound of skateboard wheels on the sidewalk behind me. When I was a young boy-crazy girl, I associated this sound with cute skater boys and their drop haircuts and oversized pants and t-shirts. It always made my ears prick up.

That was long ago. Now that I am a married lady on the eve of her 30s, I associate the sound with mu husband, who was once one of those cute skaters with comically gigantic t-shirts. He still skates, but now he wears clothes that fit. I didn't know him back in his skating heyday, but I'd rather be married to him now than have had a crush on him in 1992.

So I heard these skateboard wheels rolling towards me as I walked to work with the foamy dregs of my latte lining the paper cup in my hand. I didn't turn around, but I did move to the edge of the sidewalk to make room for the skater. He rolled past me, and it was a kid--a kid who couldn't have been more then nine years old. He had a sleeping bag tucked under his arm. He was probably coming home after spending the night at a friend's house.

It made me happy. Maybe it's just me, but it seems like you never see kids do stuff like that these days; their paranoid parents drive them everywhere. Maybe someday Joe and I will have a kid who skates to his (or her) friend's house with a sleeping bag in tow. That would ne nice. I'd have a third image to associate with the sound of skateboard wheels on pavement.

Winter Holiday, Part II

I kicked a door and hurt my foot yesterday. Not very smart, but Joe punching his truck and putting a dent in it is not very smart, either. That happened on the way home from Tahoe.

I wrote "Winter Holiday, Part I" after playing/walking in the snow for three hours. My mind was swimmign with brilliant thoughts, thoghts that rose up while the snow drifted down. Snow is good for thinking. I found an old cemetary and got nearly lost and then was found again--I walked down a dead-end road, turned around, and didn't see my footprints from earlier. Why? Because it snowed over them, duh! But that didn't keep me from panicking for a bit. I made it back okay and then ate a huge-ass lunch. Then I wrote on my laptop until the battery wore out.

Now all of my snow brilliance is lost. It melted. I'm not sure what I was going to say, only that I hope next year we are living in a place with seasons. Fall and Winter and Spring, rain and humidity and ice and leaves turning.

The rest of the trip was fun. The snowboarders returned and we played Pass the Pigs and drank wine and ate veggie chili. I put TVP in the chili and Joe and I had lethal fats for a whole day after.

We needed chains to get out. Joe bought some at a gas station and our good friends spent nearly an hour helping us get them on--otherwise, Joe and I would have been screwed. We're mechanically inept. Then we made it to the ski resort and the parking lot was full (!!), so we rolled on out of town. Once we got down out of the mountains we pulled over and did a very bad job of taking off the chains (hint: when removing snow chains, undo the hook facing the axle FIRST, then undo the one closest to you). Joe had to tear the lid off the cooler and lie down on it to get under the truck and find the back hook. This took about 20 cold, dirty mintues. Joe swore and shook. Initially it scared me, but I stood back and watched the show and admired how manly he was behaving. This is when he punched his truck. Not smart, but he did get the chains off.

As for me, I kicked a door yesterday. My stupid job in the stupid store has no immediate bathroom access. We have to walk down the sidewalk to use a public restroom. I don't mind this, but sometimes there's no soap or toilet paper. Yesterday I walked to work, and by the time I got there I had to go. The public restroom door was locked. I grumbled and decided to try again later. After 30 minutes passed, I tried again. No. Door locked. This is when I kicked the door and yelled GODDAMNIT!!! like a crazy homeless person. The right to take a dump when it's time to take a dump is important to me. I don't want to liken my job to being a POW at Guantanamo Bay.

I was wearing cowboy boots yesterday. They are not very good for kicking, and my foot hurt all day long. What is dumber, punching a truck or kicking a door? A food is harder to fix than a dent, but Joe could have hurt his hand while I merely could have scratched my boot. When Joe has a temper tantrum I usually snicker to myself...but I think all in all, my temper may be worse.

Winter Holiday Part I

Everyone else went snowboarding. I stayed behind at the house because I don’t participate in winter sports. Initially I was not even going to come to Tahoe, but once I realized I had the weekend off I figured there couldn’t be any harm in it. Our friends had access to a well-furnished cabin for free, and my husband would be driving his truck u up with or without me—so my presence made little difference, cost-wise, and I am very keen on keeping the cost aspect of travel to a minimum.

We were the first to arrive last night, and we poked around in the dark, looking for the hidden key so we could let ourselves in. The cabin—a house, really—was in a gated area right at the edge of Lake Tahoe, not too far from the highway but distanced enough from the casinos and various tourist gee-gaw shops to cast an illusion of isolation. While we waited for the others, Joe and I walked a short distance of the wet, sandy shore of Lake Tahoe. The moon was nearly full and it hung, silvery and bright, in the inky black sky. The wind on the lake was strong, conjuring waves to assault the shore. By the time the chill sent us seeking warmth, our friends had arrived and we began hauling luggage—snowboards, coolers, cases of beer—into the house.

Joe and I slept in a tiny room that was barely bigger than the double bed it housed. The heat didn’t penetrate that corner of the house, but we piled wool blankets onto the bed and pulled on our long underwear, which kept us toasty all night long. The wind and the waves continued all night long, their rhythmic cries beating at the little house’s walls.

The plan was for all of the snowboarders to rise very early in order to make the most of the slopes, but the high wind meant that most ski resorts had few, if any, ski lifts running. So we brewed pots of coffee and had a leisurely breakfast. By ten o’clock the wind had calmed, and the snowboarders suited up to try their luck, hopefully scoring half-day lift tickets at reduced prices. Joe pulled on his borrowed snowboarding pants and fiddled with his borrowed snowboard. He hadn’t been snowboarding much since he injured his shoulder in a bad fall four years ago, and though he was excited, I was a bit worried. What if he fell again? What if he didn’t fall, and he had such a great time that he wanted to make multiple trips to Tahoe each winter? That would be expensive for us, and lonely for me. But I also go on adventures of my own, and I know that he worries about me, and I wish he didn’t.

The main reason I tagged along on this trip was to figure out what people saw in this Tahoe place. It’s a four-hour drive from the SF bay area in the best of conditions; factor in snow and traffic and god knows how long it might take. But people love it. I wanted to see what all of the fuss was about.

Since I wasn’t going to the resorts with everyone, my plan was to mess around in the snow for a few hours, then retire inside to read, write, and relax. I put on the warm clothes I’d brought, thinking how special it was to be wearing them, since in California items such as heavy wool sweaters and waterproof pants didn’t come in handy very often. Those clothes were from a different part of my life—different parts, actually—and it felt good to have them on, like I was resurrecting a dead, more noble part of myself. I put a water bottle in my big blue backpack, along with a fleece vest and a packet of Espresso Love Gu. Then I pulled on a fleece headband and a coarse South American wool hat with ear flaps and stepped outside.

I walked along the lakeshore for about half a mile. Snow flurries spun madly in the air, and the mountains painting the skyline on the opposite side of the lake were completely obscured in a dingy grey haze. I could be anywhere, I thought. I walked past shuttered beach shacks and overturned sea kayaks, and I stumbled across a tiny red plastic shovel embedded in sand and ice.

Dramatic slopes populated with tall pine trees and gnarled rock outcroppings rose behind some of the houses. I wanted to hike up one, but wire fences and PRIVATE PROPERTY advised otherwise. The houses in the estate were mostly new, with a deceptive suburban residential look—that faux grandeur look of exaggerated ceilings and lofts that overlook gas-powered fireplaces that flame up with the flick of a switch. But the actual development was quite old, according to our host. Decaying piers jutting from the water attested to this, as did a plaque I found close to the one non-decayed pier. The plaque commemorated two steam-powered vessels that launched in the late 1800s, ferrying tourists around Lake Tahoe until the late 1930s. I tried to imagine what Lake Tahoe was like back then; resort towns I’d been to in the east had aging grand lodges and ramshackle cabins to point to their past, but here I saw nothing but weekend houses for well-off professionals.

I walked out the end of the pier (a sign at its gate read GOLF CARTS ONLY) and looked down in the water. The wind was kicking up again, but the depths were still quite clear; I could make out rocks and the quivering images of wooden beams descending into the sandy bottom. I imagined the summertime joy of jumping off the pier into the cool water, which was probably about ten feet deep at that spot. I also thought of poor Fredo rowing his niece around Lake Tahoe in The Godfather Part II, a movie that served as my primary reference for what the real-life Lake Tahoe was like.

After the pier, the walkable lakeshore terminated. As the snow flurries increased, I made my way along the roads, past empty vacation houses and luxury cabins with snow-covered vehicles parked in their driveways. With tall trees bordering either side of the road and no traffic to speak of, it was peaceful just to wander along the road, feeling the snow crunch under my boots. My pace was nearly lethargic, but fending off the cold for over an hour had piqued my hunger, so I tore open the Gu and slurped the sticky, sickeningly sweet mess down.

Some roads seemed promising at first, but after a steady climb they all ended in PRIVATE PROPERTY sings. Hardly anyone was around to object to my trespassing, but I wanted to be respectful, and not to wander too far away from our own little weekend house. So I followed many paths only to retrace my steps on the way out, but I didn’t care. The day was becoming whiter and whiter, and in the quiet I felt I was enjoying my own private snow day.

I recalled how once my brother and I went out in the woods behind our house on a snow day. We each had a backpack with a granola bar in it. Under what I assume was the guidance of my brother, a war movie fanatic, we pretended that we were POW escapees. What war, I’m not sure. Perhaps Vietnam, although there’s not much snow there. So let’s say Korea. We got sort of lost in the woods, ate our granola bars with freezing fingers, and we finally emerged hours later in a cornfield next to the volunteer fire station a few miles away from our house. Their flag flew half-mast, in accordance with President Regan’s declaration of national mourning for the Challenger disaster. I was happy to see the fire station and the road we could walk home on, but something about the scene seemed eerie as well. That’s a snow day for you.

Bigfoot: No LeRoy

A SPECIAL MESSAGE FROM BIGFOOT

Lately me read article by smarty-pants reporters who use Bigfoot name in same breath as JT LeRoy. This no acceptable. It part of Bigfoot creed not run into spotlight, but me no can stand for this. LeRoy no Bigfoot. Here why.

For many century me "people", the Sasquatch, try live own life of peace in boonies. Every now and then must venture out so get spotted by hunter or hiker or Humbolt county pot farmer. We no want hurt, just part our tradition to keep human on toes. There big debate on "do Bigfoot live?" and lot of nutty people make website full of "cryptozoology" with claim facts on me life. True is, me do live. But most people who think they know all Bigfoot don't know dick.

It not walk in park be Bigfoot. Have to live isolation in woods where cold and no very good place to get magazine or latte. Sometime me want make friend and just gossip about Brad and Angelina or talk about Alito confirmation hearings for Supreme Court. See, me try stay up on current event. I naturally curious. But it me duty no reveal self fully to human. Must be mystery.

But me no hoax. Me never try pull wool over eyes of believers or make lies for money--and let me tell, be Sasquatch no pay much, either. Bigfoot could use the money. But me honest and no prey on trusting public.

See, me no happy now because thing happen with little sissy-boy writer who hip kid buy book of and snobby critic say "oh he write so bracing and with so raw honesty about life on street and abuse." Gimme break. This pencilneck name JT LeRoy. Me read he book "Sarah" and almost stop read, because no make sense half time and me prefer book with strong character development and good narrative flow. This book not have that. Mostly dark, impressionistic crap about little boy who dress up like girl to make money from horny fat truckers. But me finish story because bio say JT LeRoy live life like that he-self in West Virginia. Me sometimes go vaction in West Virginia when me sick of Pacific Northeast. JT LeRoy book West Virginia no like what Bigfoot see in real state, but whatever.

Rumor say JT LeRoy shy and no read he own work in public. He too in band but no sing or be on stage, only write word. Me think if you no sing and you no play, then you no in band. But he too afraid be in front people because he skin full of zits--he young still, and no very tall. So no see LeRoy ever. But then he books start pick up fans and then LeRoy he at party with Madonna. Oh, so he no too shy meet one most famous women in world but cannot go to book signing of own book? Me say bullshit.

Picture of LeRoy start pop up. He wear wig and sunglasses and look like girl. Then he say he want be or think he is girl. Bigfoot open-minded and okay with transexuals and transgendered population, but me smell fish when LeRoy say he have the trans.

Now turn out LeRoy no write own book. LeRoy in wig at parties no LeRoy either. Stupid people in he "band" with make up LeRoy so they make money and play with fan feelings. Take advantage of goodwill and swindle celebrities. This Bigfoot never do. Me heart full of love and want all creatures of Earth to live healthy lives in harmony. Me no have material want, but maybe those reporter who say LeRoy like Bigfoot might take two seconds consider how this "LeRoy" character greedy and liar. Sure, me dream how it nice if perfumier create exclusive fragrance just for Bigfoot and Bigfoot no have to pay--but me no ask for it just to abuse me fame!

JT LeRoy, it good thing you no real person, because if me see you I bite your head off and stick it up you ass.

A Hoax, Folks?

My feelings about JT LeRoy now feel so vindicated. We own two of Mr. LeRoy's books. I enjoyed reading them--whoever it was that penned them--but they didn't rock my world. Plus, the West Virginina references didn't ring true to me. I enjoy a good mess like this one, which creates a silly hubub to distracts us so well from more urgent international matters.

My lawyer has composed the following statement in the wake of the breaking JT LeRoy scandal:

Let me assure you, dear readers, that the woman who appears in public claiming to be Sara Bir is indeed Sara Bir, the little-known writer whose harrowing background includes a difficult childhood in the semi-rural wilds of the Mid-Ohio Valley. All prior claims that Ms. Bir was a shocking sixteen years old when she experiences her first kiss, and that she once was so bored that she and her friends dyed her hair black with a Clairol product purchased at Kroger's, and that she was neither popular nor unpopular--these, kind readers, are all verifiable true events.

Ms. Bir's physical manifestation is not that of a biological male identifying as female, nor is it that of a biological female identifying as male. Ms. Bir is a woman, though she does indeed have small breasts and, at times, hairy legs.

Additionally, Ms. Bir's 2001 semi-fictional account of working at a public library populated with homeless vets was indeed based on a real-life experience. All of Ms. Bir's written allusions to drug use can be traced back to actual ingestion of drugs and alcohol--including the time she smoked a joint in the darkroom at her cooking school and then proceeded to drive her 1992 Geo Prizm across the campus to deliver the school newspaper.

Ms. Bir's occasionally mind-boggling past is 100% real. It happened. Ms. Bir is a real person, and her realness can be vouched for by countless celebrity supporters and trendkeepers--including members of several indie rock bands whose recordings have been issued on actual microscopic record labels, not self-released CDs like what go-nowhere bands have to do if they want to impress members of the opposite sex by saying "Hey, my band has a CD out." Let me reiterate: Sara Bir knows actual, certified cool people. The fact that she once sold Juliette Binoche a pint of superpremium strawberry ice cream at the gift shop of a chocolate factory is not a fabrication.

No one else but Sara Bir publishes articles and stories and blog entries under the name of Sara Bir. Sara Bir is, according to the birth certificate ensconsed in the important files in her own office, 29 years old, just as she has stated multiple times.

Sara Bir lives. She breathes. The lungs furnishing fresh oxygen to Ms. Bir's body are the lungs of Sara Bir, not the lungs of a 41-year-old male video game tester who lives with his parents on Long Island. The human being pressing the keys to make these words appear on the screen of her laptop is Sara Bir, who is not one in the same as a failed creative writer who supposedly manages the complicated personal life of and then privately assumes the persona of Sara Bir. Sara Bir is self-contained.

Thank you.