CHAPTER 28

The Reality Romp

 

   Facing semi-adulthood and wanting no part of Show & Sell, I decided to go straight and become a temporary office worker. However, my new reality was to call for more acting than I had foreseen.

   Armed with my experience of give-'em-what-they-want-to-hear-as-long-as-you-know-you-can-do-the-job, I created a past to express success, or at least financial survival.

   The resume I concocted for Kelly Girls was a testimony to creative writing. Knowing I needed to appear as regular as possible meant that my experience of tap dancing on The Jackie Gleason Show or singing the praise of Tasty Cakes was not what they wanted to read. Nor, was my early graduation from Quintano's School, where my extra activities ranged from autograph rehearsing to ad-libbing award speeches.

   Being in New York City, I fabricated graduating at 18 from a West Coast school with honors in typing. That skill was for real, as I'd become a bunt and spec speedo through all the stories I poured through my Smith Corona. I gave my age as 22 with 3 years office experience, conveniently with imaginary L.A. firms. Thus, as the ink dried, I launched myself into the Rocky River of Reality.

   Life as an undercover agent was continuing as usual, though I felt ill-prepared to deal with my emotional and physical urges as I was still hunting for a How To Kiss book.

   Temporary work felt akin to Life With Mother as I never knew what was coming next. Whether I'd be receptioning at a repressive oh!-swell hole under a tyrannical type-cat or in a posh Park Avenue spot underscored with gentle Muzak.

   Needing to always adapt made me feel I was still an actor, with my union dues now being paid to LIFE — not SAG or AFTRA.

   With all the interesting men approaching my reception desks, I felt like a diabetic in a candy store. By not knowing what my line should be after a guy said: “Let's get together sometime, honey,” I became a pro at subject changing.

   Eventually I learned to master the art of detached dating. Lunches felt safe. Dinners were too risky for my naivete.

   My visual looks, coupled with my dating illiteracy, had thrust me into the social arena unprepared for combat. The sum of Ashley's parental sex education, outside of Show & No Tell, was leaving magazines filled with strange disfiguring life scenes ripe for reading in conspicuous spots.

   I don't remember what they were called, but there was one semi-medical magazine that seemed to be written and photoed by a warped relative of the worst sin rag. It had the first picture I had seen of a man's testicles. They looked like hot air balloons, sagging down to the floor. It was titled: An Expose of the Elephantine Panic — or some such scare.

   It made the idea of growing up seem like risking a horror ride through a Ripley's Conceive It Or Not Museum! It may have been Ashley's plan to squelch any shared sex talk.

   Whatever! After seeing what I saw in those magazines, I wondered how vast the epidemic was and, if I had met any men who had it. If so, where did they hide those colossal pendulums? The slacks I noticed on fellows never showed any signs of squashed mutant watermelons.

   I wondered if Sabu the Elephant Boy might have suffered that effect by contact, and I wanted to shrink back to a 4 year old and never grow up. I prayed that Flash Gordon would adopt me and zoom me off this crazy planet. Quick!

   I now wonder if Ashley was more scared than I was at the subject of sex. Maybe she didn't have any answers because she was never allowed to question. Maybe she entered her marriage playing sex by ear without knowing the truth, or consequences. Maybe that was the cause of her anger at my coming along without her consciously inviting me to her life party. If so, was I a fate crasher?

   Skating on my cloistered mateboard through New York's male room was terribly tricky. Since I knew nothing, but felt a lot of indescribably delicious butterflies homing in my tummy, the most logical route I saw seemed to lead toward settling into a marriage as a virgin and fake it from there. After all, it was a favored plot in most movies I'd seen as a kid. Doris Day's persona became my pre-marital role model.

   Question was: Who would I activate this dream with?

   Having made this declaration to the Universe, enter Joe. I was working as a receptionist at an eastside art house that hired art students from several up state colleges to work on a trainee basis during the summer.

   Joe, one of the art interns, seemed so fresh faced and innocent, more of a kid brother image. We walked through Central Park on our lunch hour and talked of his dreams. We munched hot dogs, sipped orange juice and talked of his career plans. He quoted his college seminars. He talked a lot about his plans for a secure future. Come to think of it, he did most of the talking.

   I didn't mind listening, since he was, at least, talking to me. Needless to say, I lacked knowledge on the importance of balanced communication. I was so accustomed to keeping everything inside, this new arrangement appeared to be an advancement.

   I was further relaxed as Joe never threatened my sexual ignorance. He never even made a pass, which perhaps may have been a flapping red flag. If it was, I didn't salute.

   We began sharing evening chats, a giant step into the unknown for me. Our talks quickly turned to commitment. I heard of his family's upstate “estate” with the fishing pond. His college work. His dreams for us. His, his, his... Come to think of it, all dialogues revolved around him and his.

   My function was to figure where I fit in. The temptation to create a real life, as opposed to a reel life, encouraged me to sublimate myself into his shadow.

   The picture his words painted in my mind all seemed so Norman Rockwellish. So picket fence and apple pie-ish. I was enthralled with the possibility of being part of an actual family with real parents. Maybe Robert Young and Donna Reed were replicated as his folks!

   Whooah!! Was I asking for reality to run me over with an atomic tank? I was thoroughly ignoring one fact: My creative mind always did, and still does, image settings through my rosy colored lenses.

   So, when Joe asked me to marry and move up state with him, to join forces for his future, it seemed the answer to some eccentric fantasy. Imagining I loved him, I agreed. Though with my limited experience, I was not prepared for this road show.

   The “estate” turned out to be an piecemeal shack with mud walkways, spaghetti sauce driblets streaking over furniture on its way to being science projects, broken bed boards topped with spring piercing stained mattresses and unmade covers, 100 watt light bulbs dangled from ceiling wires, and dirty dishes performed balancing acts in the sink.

   Architectural Digest nightmares filled this unheated hut, all occupied by his dad and 2 heckling older brothers, a cast I later silently tagged as the Bigot Boys.

   Now I recall. This was my intro into bigotry. Everything and everyone not part of their rut was up for putdowns. If there were no outside targets, they lashed out at each other with flying insults and beer cans.

   What struck me as really odd was the haunting image that flashed through my mind from the day I met Joe. This vision always began with my standing in a vast multi-storied room. An inner treadmill coiled within this area, exiting at different levels. The walls were illuminated bronze, pink, gold and terra cotta, as was the dress I wore, like a half slip pulled up under my arms.

   I recall stepping on the treadmill for the ascension and feeling sick from the gloomy oppressing ambience. The cause for gloom was my brother who, when our parents died, took control and made me his servant.

   As I exited on the top level, my brother was walking to his chamber without saying a word to me. His male servant trailed behind him. As my brother lay upon a massage table, the servant rubbed his back, then silently pulled a dagger from his clothing and stabbed my brother to death.

   Suddenly the atmosphere heaved a sigh of great relief as if joy and love could now prevail in the kingdom.

   I pushed this vision aside as I could not rationalize it. I so wanted to settle down to the predictable calmness of family life and apple pies, that I muted my Nanny, my GUT Buddy, even though the estate and country serenity proved to be a far-why from my dreams. Actually, it could've been a great comedy if it weren't real. If I were not the only one smiling.

   To cut to the chase, we quasi-eloped with his mom, as Joe had no car. His mom had divorced his dad after she had an affair and ran off with the local fireman. Would the soap opera ever end?

   She got us to the church on time — unfortunately.

   The evening was highlighted by the strains of his dad peeing against the church wall, as his brother stumbling in, blottoed from Milltowns and scotch, asked: “Did I miss the fuckin' wedding?”

   All during our drive to the church and the ceremony, that dreamscape kept repeating in my mind. I kept asking myself: Why? Who is this “brother”? Tell me, Nanny!

   As I said “I do”, Nanny gave the answer.

   I saw the face of my “brother” after he was stabbed and turned over by his assailant. It was Joe, my new husband of 3 seconds.

   That night while we prepared to go to bed in his mom's tiny spare bedroom, Joe was fiddling with stuff under his side of the bed.

   I went to check it out and saw a baseball bat, a rifle and an antique dagger. I asked why he stored this arsenal.

   He said: “I have this feeling that when I'm on my stomach, someone I know will come from behind and stab me.”

   BINGO!

   And, so began my first night of wedded bliss.

Copyright © 2004 by Krystiahn