LIVE THE LIFE OF A SCREWBALL HEROINE

(text sampled from “What's a Modern Girl to Do?” by Maureen Dowd, October 30, 2005, New York Times Magazine)

   end the evening with the offering, an insincere bid

be critical of absolutely everything

          lose the literary pretensions 

embrace simple-minded gender stereotypes

                  desire to be the superior force

be in the grind

wear padded bras

    think of my breasts as props

move seamlessly

be more of a zigzag than a superhighway

*

                                                                                      flash forward to 2030

                                      dream of being rescued

be a misguided notion

                                      (be a more flexible and capacious notion)

                                                                                                      ratchet up 

                                                                   take our quiz

          shudder at the retro implications

                                                          dance the Continental like Fred and Ginger

choose one over the other

                                         eat their cake

                                                                nibble the pastry and lick the icing

take pictures of them

      make comments about them

                                                 then take their places

                      avoid sarcasm

do not think of domestic life

*

                                                                                                cook hamburger

stretch and protrude to extreme proportions

                                                                   have a lot of stuff to do

have a lot of stuff

           spend hours finding a hip-slimming dress

                                                                                                snap and crackle

lie on a chaise lounge

                                      disdain female proclivities

                                                                                    be a sex object

                                                yell out during sex

mean it as a compliment

                                           scream to the heavens

                                                                             do it again in a couple of decades

*

                                     be the essence of evil

do real damage

                          demonize Barbie and Cosmo girl

                                                                         earn money

                                                                                            have “girl money”

                                            talk about “girl money”

drive a nice car

                          get serious later

                                                   prefer women who seem malleable and awed

have an unfair advantage

                                      trade beauty and sex

                                                                        be infinite

                                                                                         last a nanosecond

                                                stay on the phone

*

ignore gender politics and seismic shifts

                                                               hit on a primal fear  

        marry rich enough

            marry up  

                             marry down

marry

                   drink martinis

                                                drive up dopamine in the brain

                                                                                                   fritter away

allow deluded creatures to think they are hunters

               deprive them  of their chance to hunt

                                   deceive so they can win

care for them

                        protect their eggshell egos

                                                                    stop them before a credit card

                                stay soft as a kitten

      play hard to get

                                                          tell me that my idea was widely romanticized

put it aside as an anachronism

                                             leave it to my sisters in black turtlenecks and Birkenstocks

believe I’m 46

                               wear a fancy suit

       acknowledge your inner slut

                                                   see me strip

*

                                                                       veer away from “challenging” women

be sexual, this time protected by the pill

                                                                                  shop for “Stepford Fashions”

come to life in Sarah Jessica Parker’s Carrie Bradshaw

                                                                                pass a lacy handkerchief

brush up on venerable tricks

                                                borrow my out-of-print copy

                                                                                              shut up

bear a child

                     end up on this path delaying

brag

            brag the moniker Mrs.

                                               want to be Mrs. Anonymous

                                                                                            switch to Ms.

return to prefeminist mind games

                                                    prognosticate a world

                                                                                      be a turnoff

                                                         embrace Botox

                             say things

promise

*

create a brazen new world

                                         fit in with the brazen new world

                                                                                           work above them

                                                work below them

start falling into them

                                     nurture them in some way

                                                                             dye their hair

                                                                                                    speak English

be full of passionate and full-throated debate about the big stuff

                                                                                                keep thinking

keep thinking of yourself

                                      keep thinking of yourself as a mysterious cat

                      pony up

get the check 

THE TALLEST GIRL AND I PLAY MYSTERY DATE

In junior high most of my asthma prescriptions stopped working

and I had to go on Somophyllin, a serum that had to be inserted in my rectum. 

It was the only thing that could stop attacks and my mother

taught my best friend Beth Cote how to give it to me.  Beth

was the tallest girl in junior high, who had a crush on a short boy named Wayne,

who I think liked her too, though he only came up to her ribs.

If I wanted to go to a sleepover I had to carry a small jar of Vaseline, a syringe,

and my bottle of Somophyllin.  I had to find a mom to ask if I could keep it

in the fridge. The Somophyllin was thick and clear, like shampoo, and whenever

I had trouble breathing I would draw it up (8 cc’s) and find a bedroom

where Beth would give it to me.  I would pull my underpants down

and lie on my side and she would find the right place. The medicine felt cold going in,

but in about ten minutes I could breathe again. Beth was never ashamed

and I wasn’t ashamed.  She wanted to be a nurse when she grew up

and said I was a good practice patient.  She never told anyone

that she stuck medicine up my butt, which showed remarkable trust. 

She’d even wash the syringe, put it back into the plastic tube it came in,

and kept me company until I could breathe right again.

She wasn’t afraid I would die.  She wasn’t easily riled

by gossip or illness.  She used words like “doohickey” and “fanny,”

which made her seem older than she was, almost boring, except when she talked

about Wayne.  After school we played a game of Mystery Date.

"Will he be a dream (sigh) or a dud (groan)?"

This was the tag line from the commercial that we would repeat

nonstop until her lanky older brother shrieked that we were lezzy freaks. 

Our real questions were:  How would Beth ever find a boyfriend

being that tall? How would I ever find a boyfriend

with my breathing problems and Somophyllin?  Beth’s father

had died when she was a baby and I’d always wondered

what his height was. Her mother was a giantess who worked part time

in a beauty parlor. She wore heels and teased her hair, which made her

even taller.  Let me tell you a thing or two about men, she said

and began to talk which, I could tell, embarrassed Beth.

But I was fascinated with Mrs. Cote’s eyeliner and beige nail polish

as she cut us squares of upside-down cake, maraschino cherries

bleeding obscenely into pineapple rings. 

THE WIDOW

          for NK

She dove to such a deep place

that she was on the bottom of the black ocean

below the anemone fish and coral reefs.   Her pink lipstick

smeared when she ate peel-and-eat shrimp.  She held on

to her compact and pain and her memoir she’d started five days ago

and her two cats and her roommate and her sanctuary

and her wedding ring she threw in the grate after his death

and the new fake wedding ring she bought herself

to replace it.  Widow, window, wind, wide world, Windex.

There are some things you can’t wash away, some smudges

that stay on the glass no matter how hard you scrub.

My favorite lipstick is Revlon #90, Bali brown.

I wore it for six years and then it became hard to find,

so whenever I saw it at a drugstore, I would buy two.

And then, last year, it was just gone completely.

Women always asked, Where did you get that lipstick? 

It’s perfect for your coloring.  I kept trying to match it

and bought about six other lipsticks—too dark, too brown,

too bronzy, too matte, until I found one I could live with,

though for me it was a little too pink.

It was the kind of lipstick that would have looked good

on the widow, the poet-mermaid with glossy black hair

whose tragedy was the tragedy half of us

will face eventually, if we are lucky—

if we find a love like she found.   I finally unearthed

a tube of Revlon Bali brown lipstick

on e-bay—it was discontinued, twice the price

of what I paid originally, but I kept bidding—

I couldn’t help it.   My chance to recapture

what I thought was gone forever.  I am careful now

about how often I reapply, knowing I’m only postponing

the eventual concave nub.