| Entry tags: | hating cortez, learning to accept what i am, learning to accept what is, life, manayunk tavern, my friends think i am ugly la la, neil young's warrior heart, philadelphia, shaun, shut your eyes and sing to me, so damn unpretty |
my stories've got tongues and tails, a rocket-ship and water like smooth, clear sailing
I am spoilt and ugly, I have discovered.
From time to time, Shaun takes me to a local tavern with ridiculously wonderful music. O, I know you're all tired of me proclaiming it's genius when a college DJ plays Neil Young with anything remotely modern, but that's how it is. Neil Young is hella amazing. I am all over it when I hear him on a station, followed by something sublime like, say, Snow Patrol. Imagine hearing the somnambulent, belly-stroking guitar of Neil's "Cortez the Killer" and a phrase like "Hate was just a legend and war was never known." Then, take yourself across the river to "Shut your eyes and think of somewhere, somewhere cold and caked in snow. / By the fire we break the quiet, and learn to wear each other well" with Snow Patrol's "Shut Your Eyes," and you'll see what I mean, maybe. I like marrying songs to each other, making it an experience. When someone else does it for me, for instance a great DJ, I fall into one of the big, girlish crushes I am prone to having on everything and everyone.
If you've ever seen Neil Young play live with his band, Crazy Horse, you'll know why I love him so. Neil Young and the other guys in Crazy Horse huddle in a spiritual circle, playing to each other and to the sky, a stance I've seen at many a powwow. Neil has the soul of an Amerindian, the tongue of a drunk Dylan Thomas, and the heart of a buffalo. Think these things and put him on the record player, and tell me I'm wrong. Plus, he knows about history. He and I both share a hatred for Pocahontas and Cortez. "Cortez the Killer," when it came out, was controversial. Most American history books still called the murderers and rapists of the so-called "New World" explorers who "discovered" the Americas. I've said it before, but I could walk to the corner market, which clearly has been there for like, a million years, and say I discovered it because it's the first time I ever saw it, but it doesn't mean I discovered jack.
Anyway, I digress. My stories are riding shotgun with other stories today, getting ready to do some drive-bys on some stale poems. My stories are having picnics on the grass with each other, building lives in the country, and thinking about buying season tickets to Knicks games with Spike Lee. My stories, my stories, they've got lives and legs of their own. My stories're popping pimples, drinking acid-lemonade, and pasting pictures of boy-bands on the walls, while thumbing through a nudie mag with animal faces drawn all over the models' bodies. I'm not skerred of my stories. It's just that they run my life sometimes. Look at them now, making a date with disaster and thinking I should be taking cooking classes and getting a faux-hawk, all in one swoop.
Back to the tavern. It reminds me of the places my dad took me to when we lived in Alaska, but without the seal-skin hanging in the windows and on our feet and the jars of pickled seagull eggs on the counter. The brick walls have been struck with hammers in some places to show the older, more beautiful detailed plaster beneath it. The ceilings are high and hung with punched tin designs, just like the Victorians had. I adore it.
A college age guy works there. I know he's got to own more than this one striped rugby shirt, but after all the times we've been there, at all hours of the day and night, that's all I've seen him in. I don't even know what his voice sounds like, because he mutters at us. But it's a very nice mutter, and he always makes sure our drinks are filled and our plates are full or pulled, so we like him. You want to bring me the best horseradish Bloody Mary I've ever had with an extra long stalk of celery in it and mumble to me? It's okay, brother; I mean, hey, I do weird things, too, like making up little songs to sing while doing the dishes and watching America's Next Top Model when I'm doing my crunches. Mami, I will be eliminated tonight! At least I don't look like I got hit with a bag of motherfuckers.
Then, I wonder. About looking like I got hit with a bag of motherfuckers, that is. I've come to terms with the fact that I don't look like anyone else I've met. Unusual doesn't necessarily translate into pretty. Pretty can be boring or too easily defined. I'm well aware that I have a long ski-slope of a nose, super-broad shoulders, huge feet, a lotta ass, overly muscular back and arms, fat lips, big bug eyes, and the messiest hair ever made. I yam what I yam, to quote a famous sea-salt by the name of Popeye. I know that there's things that make me lovely, and I accentuate those, while (most of the time) pretending not to notice those traits that'll mean I'll never be considered traditionally beautiful or even attractive by some people. There's no middle ground with me. People either think I am confusingly and incredibly attractive or deem me ugly (like the women in Mali, who said I was too skinny to ever be a good wife and so, made fun of me daily).
However, I got my feelings hurt a little the other day in a really stupid way. I cannot even believe I'm admitting it. On this (let's say it again) stupid Facebook application, people can compare their friends to each other. One comparison comes up for whether you are pretty or not. Apparently, none of my friends think that I am pretty. They all have voted me the best singer, which is just plain bewildering. I mean, aside of those of you who knew me when I lived in a Chicago ghetto and would sing for my supper, have any of you heard me sing? Maybe my friends got me confused with the other Jewel. You know, the really famous one who also lived in Alaska, has blonde hair, and is musical?
The thing that bothered me, stupidly again, is that none of my friends thought I was pretty. In fact, everyone seemed to vote me for things like best smelling, most famous, and best singer, which again, is totally confounding. I do smell nice, but most people aren't up in my business to know that. Famous? What?! Because I bang my little drum noisily and do a lot of weird things? I guess I do look like I got hit with a bag of motherfuckers, more than I'd told myself in all the nasty pep-talks before.
This brings us back to the tavern. (Stories riding with stories on a banana-seat bicycle and carrying other stories in a little plastic basket with daisies on it.) Shaun and I walked into our tavern on Easter Sunday, sick of pastel eggs and people yelling "He is risen" (it's Philadelphia, people scream about Jesus here). As we were settling in at our usual table, a blonde lady at the bar swiveled around and screeched. I cringed, thinking she was going to tell me about Jesus at a loud decibel (nothing against Jesus, I just hate loud noises). "You look just like that really famous actress! You know!" The entire bar peered at me for a look. "That really beautiful one!"
I stood there, feeling self-conscious and not knowing what to say. Over the years, I've had a lot of comparisons to actresses. The three names that inevitably get tossed into the ring for consideration are Daryl Hannah, Uma Thurman (Kill Bill era), and Marilyn Monroe. What any of these ladies have in common beyond being blonde and emotional, I've yet to figure out. Every once in a while, someone will say Lauren Bacall (ed note: I just saw that we share the same birthday, September 16. Well, all right, Lauren Bacall, all right!). Again, I am not sure why.
"Scarlett Johanssen," someone to my side muttered. I thought it was the rugby-for-life waiter, but it was Shaun. He understood that I was feeling overwhelmed, over-scrutinised, and just plain over-worked. He bought me French onion soup, two splendid drinks, and an Italian parmigiana something or other that soothed my wounded pride. Like I said, I am spoilt.
What I wanted to say to the lady, if I hadn't been so self-conscious about my appearance, was "I LOOK LIKE ME." Of course I didn't. Having an entire room of people suddenly examining me made me nervous. So I sat down, had myself a damn drink, and listened to the music that always takes me to the places I need to be. At night, as I was removing my make-up and seeing my pores in high-definition in my fluorescent mirror, I wondered why I tear myself down. I have no wishes to change the way I was born. I am just desperate to accept it for what it is, hurt feelings, awkward moments, and all. Damnit, isn't that what we all want?
talullah belle
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muse) wrote,
