Oranges

This is for you, Tom.  Because tomorrow is your birthday. 

Good friends, let's to the fields—I have a fever.

After a little walk, and by your pardon,

I think I'll sleep.  There is no sweeter thing,

Nor fate more blessed, than to sleep.  Here, world,

I pass you like an orange to a child:

I can no more with you.  Do what you will.

~Edgar Lee Masters,

from "To-morrow Is My Birthday"

Tell Me I'm Pretty

The thing is, he was really sexy.

I mean, he was the kind of sexy that made me thank my lucky stars that I had an IUD because otherwise I would have spontaneously ovulated.  And while I do not have a specific “type”, every second I spent near this man convinced me that if I had to choose one, he would be it.

He had this deep, rumbling kind of voice with the slightest hint of a Canadian accent, heavily tattooed forearms, and about four days worth of a dark beard.  His grin provoked two perfectly symmetrical dimples and crinkled up the corners of his blue eyes which, as Vera the South Central Oracle would be happy to see, had a very mischievous twinkle.  He was taller than me wearing my highest heels, so he must have been about six feet tall.  He was built like a lumberjack; and he had the hands of a man who worked for a living.  He was also the lead singer of the band, wrote music reviews for the city paper, and had a particular interest in vintage pin-ups. 

So.  Intensely.  Sexy.

He was also completely, unabashedly interested in me.  So when he suggested that we go back to his place, of course I said yes.

Back it up for a second:

I was in The North visiting Alejandro.  Well, except I don’t think I was much of a visitor.  I mainly spent a lot of time up in The Tower, the guest room located on the fourth floor of Alejandro’s city townhouse, or as Alejandro calls it, "My Room", since I’m the only one who stays there. 

And it was really nice being back at Alejandro's place, and seeing him and his partner Andrew, and Kathleen, their fabulous Irish neighbor, and our friend Philip, all smiles and laughs and high energy.  Of course, as nice as it was, I still couldn't sleep at night to save my life, and I still spent a bunch of time alone up in The Tower, sitting of the big, fluffy bed and enjoying 

the peaceful silence.  And it was a bit like being locked in a fairy tale tower—solitary to be sure, but also safe.  And I could gaze out my little window down the sunny patio four stories below me, with potted herbs and flower boxes with bright gerbera daisies, or look out onto the skyline of the huge city surrounding me. 

It was…tranquil.  The difference between solitude and loneliness.  Because I when I couldn’t handle, you know, having people look at me, I could sit in The Tower by myself, but I  still knew Alejandro and Andrew were nearby.  I could hear them milling about the house, living their lives, and when Alejandro decided it was time, he’d climb up the 100 stairs to The Tower, stick a glass of water or a cocktail in my hand and decree, “It’s time to come downstairs, gurl.”  Or he’d hand me my purse and say, “We have to take Cuchulain to puppy class, and he says that Aunt Lulu can’t miss it,” knowing that I can never say no to a puppy. 

And Alejandro, who is just about as different from me as you can get, personality-wise, has this method of normalizing my crazies in such a low-pressure way that I actually started to relax.  He’d let me hide when I needed to, but then he’d tell me what to do when he decided it was time for me to stop.  We drank sangria on his lovely, safe patio on the breezy summer nights, and he brought me out into the bustle of the city just enough to challenge me.  Alejandro was beautifully nurturing in the most understated way that I felt some of the tension slowly releasing inside of me.  Just a little bit of the tension, but I had so much that even just a little bit made a difference.

So on my last night there, I don’t know.  When I got to chatting with this awesome, charming, sexy stranger...for the first time in months, I almost forgot that I was broken.  Almost.  So when he asked me back to his place, I thought sure, you know?  We’ll go back to his place, and we’ll have a drink, and he’ll tell me I’m pretty, and we’ll make out on his couch.  That would be really great.  And then I’ll figure out if it will go any farther during the Waffle Window.

What Would I Do?

I never expected I’d be writing something like this again. Somehow, it just never occurred to me. The last dregs of the arrogance of my youth, perhaps? But here I am. Here goes:


A week ago, my dear friend Tom committed suicide. (Strangely enough, on Mr. Badger’s birthday.) After struggling with depression for a long, long time, he took an intentional overdose and died. He was about three weeks away from his 50th birthday.


It feels strange for me to write this, but I wasn’t entirely surprised. That’s not to say that I ever suspected that he was suicidal, but more to say that there are some people who have The Demons, which makes the day-to-day struggle of life a little more precarious than it is for the rest of the population. Tom had The Demons. I do, too. I think that’s one of the reasons we understood each other so well.


Tom and I first met when he was acting in the musical Falsettos during a summer theatre season, and I was working the box office all day and then house managing the theatres all night because hey, a girl’s gotta pay the rent. Tom was a A Town Near You native, and a local actor, and significantly older than me, so I was a little intimidated by him at first, but he was just so warm and welcoming that in no time he and the cast and I were going out every night after rehearsals, which turned into the cast coming in early for rehearsals every day so they could hang out and chat with me while I worked the box office, which turned into going out every night after the shows.


And after bar time each night, we’d creep into this abandoned downtown apartment that had had the electricity cut off. We’d pack the essentials to take along with us each night—candles, liquor, and toilet paper—and we’d set up shop on the carpet underneath the huge windows and have intimate candlelit conversations into the wee hours of the morning. And early the next afternoon, Tom would show up at the theatre, bright eyed and bushy tailed and ready to work, and he’d hand me a Jamba Juice “with extra protein—for the hangover” and we’d chat until it was time for him to go in.


Tom loved musical theatre. I don’t. I really, really don’t. But mainly because I hate the way that in the US, people think that the only theatre is musical theatre. Tom and I used to debate this. But nevertheless, each night when I would house manage, I found myself keeping a close eye on my watch to make sure that I was in the lobby of Tom’s theatre each night during his final song so that I could listen to it over the monitors. For those of you who don’t know, the uber-nutshell version of Falsettos is that it’s the story of a married-with-a-kid man named Marvin who leaves his wife for his younger male lover, and that lover dies of AIDS. At the end of the play, Marvin sings a song that says:


What would I do if I had not met you?
Who would I blame my life on?
Once I was told that all men get what they deserve.
Who the hell then threw this curve?
There are no answers.
But who would I be if you had not been my friend?


And Tom…he sold it. I mean, he sold it like only someone who knows the depths of the human experience could. And each night, I’d listen to him singing over the monitor in the lobby, and I’d cry and simultaneously hate that I was crying, and then I’d run back to my office to straighten myself up before the house was released.


And one night…I don’t know. Tom’s song just hit me and stuck, and I couldn’t really get myself together again. So much to my embarrassment, I was still trying to get the crying under control when Tom came out of the dressing room. Clearly, he thought something was seriously wrong, and all I could get out was, “It’s your song!” before I burst into a new round of tears, and he held both of my hands and looked me in the eye and said, “I know. I know.”


And the thing is, Tom did know. He knew about the heart and the soul and the depths of human emotion. And you could tell Tom anything without embarrassment or shame because as the thing was coming out of your mouth, Tom was nodding his head as if he already knew that that was exactly what you were going to say. He was an expert at dealing with human vulnerabilities because he understood that all human beings were vulnerable and fragile. Including himself. So while sure, Tom could hold his own when it came to bitching about stuff in the way that only theatre people can, he was simultaneously one of the kindest, most nurturing people I ever met. He did not just treat people well, but he treated people lovingly. And every last person who met him absolutely adored him for it. I don’t think I knew anyone so universally loved by the general public. Except for maybe Trudie.


So years later, when we began months of physical theatre training together, it was easy to jump into some really risky work together—not because we were already friends, but because of the kind of friend he was. Tom was someone you could really tune into; he let you connect with him. He offered unwavering support, and he could always tell if you needed a kind word or a shoulder rub or some down-to-earth, no-nonsense advice. So we trained so hard together and we shared secrets and we made beautiful art and worked with each other’s bodies. And really—once you truly trust someone with your body, when you’ve really worked with someone’s body, you’re bonded together forever. And we knew that.


And we laughed. So much. So hard. So many times after spending an evening in Tom’s company, I’d wake up the next morning with my entire core aching from laughing so hard with him. Because he was a funny man, and his laugh was big and contagious. And he laughed with his whole being, you know? Where every inch of his soul was engaged in the joy of the laughter. I always thought it was the way that those of us with The Demons laugh—you know, like you’re given this moment that’s joyful and hilarious and perfect, so you just surrender everything up to it. And you can really appreciate how perfect a thing humor is because you know just how un-funny life can be, so you jump into it up to your neck and revel in it while it lasts. People with The Demons are always the best laughers, and if I heard Tom laughing down the hall or something, my first instinct was to run towards it, to follow the sound of his laughter, because wherever Tom was laughing was definitely the place you wanted to be.


And if you couldn’t catch him laughing, you could always come use the bathroom at Coquette Centre—my old apartment in A Town Near You that I shared first with Charlotte, then later with Sophia—where we had a framed, autographed headshot of Tom hanging in our bathroom in a precise position where if you sat down to pee, he’d be watching you. And it’s hard for a girl to laugh and pee at the same time, but I’ll be damned if it didn’t happen more times than you’d think, with Tom’s half sexy/half serious headshot face staring at me.


And now…it’s hard to conceive of a world without Tom in it, without him out there laughing and singing. And there are a million things that I’ll never be able to look at again without thinking of him, like birthday hats and noise-makers, horoscopes, oranges, da Vinci’s Last Supper, Jamba Juice—with out without extra protein, John Malkovich, my silver cake server…lots and lots of things, little small things that I always connect to Tom in my head.


And Tom’s decision to commit suicide…of course, I wish he hadn’t done it. Of course, I wish that the rest of the world and I had just one more chance to help him, just one chance to get him to change his mind. Of course, I wish he were still here. But it was his choice, so I can’t begrudge him that. It was his body, and his life and his struggle, and he's the only one who knew what he was really going through, so it was his choice to make. And as much as I wish he were still here, I understand that choice.


So the thing that hits me in the chest every couple of hours and leaves me gasping for air is the thought of how much pain he must have been in to make that final decision. He must have been in so much pain, and no one could see the extent of it. The thought of him bearing all that pain all by himself…I think of it, and I can’t breathe. And I find myself wondering, did he really feel all alone? Did he think he had no one to turn to? Did he feel like he was unloved? And I find myself hoping with everything I have that Tom knew how much we all loved him, that we loved that man to bits, and that maybe he knew everyone loved him, but that it just wasn’t enough.


Because everyone did love him. And we still do.


So just once more for the record, Tom, even though it is too late:


I love you, you beautiful, kind, delightful man. I love you.

Birthday Boy

Since I've never been in this kind of situation before, I don't know how appropriate it is to mark this day.

You would have been 35.

Happy Birthday, Mr. Badger.



Coop: or, What I Got, Part the Second

[Note:  So, I wrote this shortly after my previous Coop-based blog post, but I just couldn't manage to edit or revise.  But I can't add anything new until I post it, since I can't stand to have a Part the First without a Part the Second.  So here it is, in all of it's un-revised, un-edited glory.  ~Lulu]

Another strange thing about the way Coop magically shows up at the exact moment I need an old friend around is that he has no idea that he’s doing it. It just so happens that at the exact moment the proverbial shit hits the even more proverbial fan in my life, Coop starts to feel old, so he looks me up to get a hit of youth.


Now, Coop isn’t old at all. He’s maybe six months to a year older than me. But he starts to feel old. And really, he started a family super young, and you know, he’s got three little kids and a wife and a mortgage and he has to work two jobs to keep it all afloat—dude, I start to feel a little haggard just thinking about it. And since his whole reason to move to The Snowy Cities in the first place was to make music with his band, I can see how he’d feel like his youth has slipped away.


So he calls me. And asks me what new bands I’m listening to and what places I’ve traveled to and what trouble I’ve gotten into and yeah, maybe who I’ve lent my heart out to. He wants to hear about my “adventures” because for him, I think it helps him remember his youth. (Which totally isn’t gone—it just feels like it’s gone.) But because I don’t have a partner or kids or a house or Cub Scouts meetings or anything like that, he thinks I’m still “young”.


Which I am, but not in the way he means it.

Coop: or, What I Got, Part the First

So, I’ve been chatting a lot with my old friend Coop lately. We’ve been out of touch for a little while, but about two months ago—right when I got back from my visit to South Central—he messaged me, saying that he missed my “antics” and wanted to make me a mix tape, since I’m the only one cultured enough to appreciate his advanced musical tastes. I was delighted at this message because it combined three of my favorite things: 1.) some one I love, 2.) personalized mix tapes, and 3.) shameless flattery.


Now, Coop is a regular guy. And by that, I mean he’s not a SuperHero or a SuperVillain, a SideKick or a Mystic or an Oracle. He’s certainly a unique and intriguing person, but he’s a regular person, too. That being said, he does possess this knack for popping back into my life at the exact moment I need an old friend around. I mean, it’s uncanny. Something really scary or overwhelming or heartbreaking will happen that sends me reeling, and just like magic, Coop appears out of nowhere, mailing me a story he wrote about me, or his band’s new CD, or making fun of my upper lip.


So I get back from South Central at the end of May feeling all sad and shaky, and I can’t fall asleep to save my life, and suddenly there’s Coop messaging me at 4am. And it’s been pretty consistent the last two months, which has been really comforting considering what’s been happening this summer. I mean, when someone, you know, leaves you, no one can ever take that person’s place. You’re always going to have a hole in your heart the exact shape of that person. It’s like a puzzle piece—no other piece is going to fit that spot exactly. But it’s amazing when someone shows up at just the right moment to remind you that yeah, your heart may have a piece missing, but ya still got some other pieces left.


Coop has a way of doing that. But I would never tell him that in a million years because he would bust my chops about it mercilessly until the day I die.


Now, Coop and I go way back. We have a pretty big history, which is maybe how he just psychically knows when to get a hold of me. We met during my very first class in college—Speech 101. Paranoid I was going to get lost and arrive late, I showed up at the classroom about 20 minutes early, so I was sitting in the room all alone, a little 17 year-old punk rock girl in her nose ring and army surplus combat boots, when Coop kind of wandered into the room in a referee shirt and a tweed jacket. Since we were the only ones in the room—oh, and since I have good manners—I looked up and said hi when he came in, at which point Coop just kind of looked at me and sat down without saying a word. I was mortified.

The Facebook Philosopher

God, I fucking hate Facebook.



Okay, I take that back. Facebook can be a pretty awesome way to remain in contact with your people, especially when you’re not living near most of them. But with Facebook, yeah, it’s awesome that your people can find you, but of course that also means that people who *aren’t* your people can find you as well. And then you’re continually forced to evaluate what it means to be a “friend”.



So, I got this friend request a few days ago, and it’s just sitting there, making me crazy. And it’s making me crazy because I’m not sure what do to do about it. But just leaving it there brings up all this bad juju whenever I open the Facebook. Bad juju, not to mention a complicated ethical quandary.



So here’s why it’s complicated:



During my last year teaching at South Central, there was a rumor circulating about me regarding sexual misconduct. More specifically, that I was having an affair with a student. Apparently, this rumor was raging pretty seriously that whole year, although I did not hear even a whisper of it until after I left, and the student who has friend requested me was one of the chief gossipers perpetuating it.



See: complicated.



I actually use Facebook for social purposes. I say hi to my friends, I post links to them, I update my status with ridiculous little happenings. It’s not a networking tool for me or anything like that, and I don’t “collect” friends. So I actually reject friend requests. I’m not elitist about it or anything, but dude, I have to remember you, and I have to actually like you. So, we went to high school together but I can’t remember anything but your name? Ignore. We went to school together, and you were a giant douchebag? Ignore. You’re an ex and we had a horrible breakup and haven’t spoken since? Ignore. I just can’t be obligated to give people access to my little virtual community just because they ask for it.



So now with this former-student Friend Requester, I have to figure out the right thing to do. I mean, I’ve never said anything to this student about her role in the rumor, and to be honest, I really don’t want to now. I have no desire to stir up any drama, and I just don’t have the energy to deal with it. But on the other hand, I don’t want to condone the behavior, and I certainly don’t want to implicitly indicate that that kind of behavior is okay. I’m not angry; I’m not holding a grudge; but I also don’t want to be a great big liar and somehow indicate that we are “friends”, even in the Facebook sense. So what I’m wondering is, what is my ethical responsibility here? If I want to take the high road and do the right thing (rather than necessarily the easiest thing) what is it?



After some time has passed after a hurtful event, my impulse is always to say, “Oh, it’s okay,” but I know that that comes from me being the peacemaker. Because if I could choose for anything in the world to happen, I’d just want everyone to be happy. Unfortunately, this tendency to oh-it’s-okay away hurtful events ends up setting me up to experience them over and over, so it’s not always the best option. And sometimes, too, I think it’s a way for me to push a painful experience away, rather than just let it exist and be what it is. Because if you say it’s all okay, then the hurtfulness disappears, right? It’s flawed logic, and I’m trying to avoid falling into it.



Because really, the whole thing was pretty devastating. I mean, students gossip about their professors. I know that, and on most levels I’m comfortable with that because I know it’s basic human behavior. Like, when I got to South Central I knew there was a bunch of gossip—among students and faculty—about whether I was a lesbian or not. I actually got a kick out of that one, you know, watching people trying to figure it out while speaking to me. Usually people gossip about me, and I think it’s mildly funny, or I don’t really care.



But at the same time, once I got to South Central, I realized that I would probably have to me more careful than my peers about appearing to be above reproach. I mean, being a woman, being young, being single, and perhaps more importantly, not being a part of the main church—and indeed, not being a Christian at all—I knew that these were all factors that I’d have to finesse in order to establish myself as someone who could still be a respected member of the college. And while this might sound very 1970s and aren’t we beyond all that now, let me say this: I was the only unmarried woman on the faculty who was under 55. That speaks volumes. And of course, these are just the baseline factors, besides the ones that are unique to me being me. And I quickly realized that there weren’t people like me hanging around South Central, so I knew I’d probably start some tongues a-waggin’ about something or other if I wasn’t careful.



So I was careful. I went to school in Professor Drag, instead of the cherry-print rockabilly dresses that my closet was bursting with. Good god, I wore awful polyester trousers because they’re “respectable”…such horrible, horrible trousers because they convey more authority than the electric blue tights I really wanted to wear. I wore sweater vests and brown shoes. I wore padded bras every day so there would be no chance of anyone seeing my nipple piercings through my shirt.



And while appearances are, sadly, a big part of what people deem respectable, I also didn’t talk about my personal life. I tried not to swear. (It was a heroic effort that I ultimately failed.) I didn’t talk smack about people. I refused to be pulled into student gossip or drama. I left my office door wide open when students came in to talk to me. And when conversations veered even slightly in a direction that some churchy, blue-haired grandmother might deem inappropriate, I’d change the subject or say, “You know, I really can’t be involved in a conversation like this.” It felt ridiculous at times, but somehow I knew it was necessary. Because hey, if I were 19 years old and stuck in BFE, I’d sure the hell gossip about me.



So when this rumor was revealed to me—not only that I was apparently having an affair with a student, but that it had been going on for the whole year, and that “a lot” of students actually believed it—my heart just about stopped. Because I had tried so hard to play by these strange, provincial rules while still being, you know, a genuine human being. And because with all the misery that was South Central—and really, the town, the job, the social life, the resources, the atmosphere, even the frickin’ landscape…all of it was miserable—the students were pretty awesome. As soon as I got there, I noticed that they seemed to be kinder to each other, more respectful of one another than at other places I had taught. And while they weren’t particularly warm with me to start with, I eventually made some pretty strong bonds with these passionate, enthusiastic students who were really good people. And when it felt like my job and the town were beating me down, I’d remind myself that the students were the reason I was there, and that made it better. So it was beyond shocking to discover that some of those same students believed that I’d have an affair with one of their classmates.



And part of it is probably that I was sexually harassed for three years in high school by this teacher named Mr. Jeffries. He taught English and Film Studies, but most significantly, he was the director of the drama program at my school, which means I saw him just about every day for three years. He’d do stuff like talk about how big my breasts were. He’d speculate on the sexual activities of me and my high school crush, and he’d warn me that true love means being willing to sleep in the wet spot. He’d stand in front of my English class and say things like, “Well, you know Lulu…she puts out like a gumball machine.” Dude, I was 15 and had never even kissed a boy and didn’t even realize that there was a wet spot after sex, and this man would stand in front of my class and tell everyone I was easy.



And there were other things—like he’d “accidentally” show up in the wings during a quick change. Or after rehearsal, he’d let the kids use the phone in his office to call for rides home, but when I would, he’d wait until I’d get on the phone, and then he’d tickle me, since I was insanely ticklish. But you know, since my mom would be on the other end of the phone, I wouldn’t be able to run away. It sucked. But since it was all in public, and since it was “just a joke”, then somehow it was supposed to be okay.



When I went away to college, he wrote me paper letters. On my first break, I went back home to my high school to say hi to some of my old teachers. Mr. Jeffries found me, brought me into an empty office in the woodshop to eat lunch with him, and then asked me on a date. I had just turned 18. He was 40? Maybe 45? It was only about 5 years ago that he finally stopped sending Christmas cards to me at my parents’ address.



That experience gave me an intense, visceral understanding of the importance of respecting the power hierarchy between teachers and students. Because the power hierarchy is there, and there’s a huge responsibility that goes along with it.



And if you can’t be careful and respectful with that power, then you have no business being a teacher. And since the first day I entered a college classroom as the instructor at the tender age of 21—yeah, teaching students who were older than me—I’ve been almost freakishly careful of respecting students’ position in that hierarchy. So the idea that this specific kind of rumor could not only be circulated about me, but that people would actually believe it—I was completely gutted.



And I guess the reason it’s complicated with this particular Friend Requester is that her gossiping was a very specific betrayal. During my first show in South Central, she was my stage manager and insisted that this was what she wanted to do as a career. So I took that very seriously and tried to train her as such. One day, I caught her complaining about me—right outside of the bathroom door of the theatre. I opened the door and said, “Okay, the first rule of stage managing is that if you absolutely must bitch about your director, you don’t do it at the theatre where she can hear you.” And we had a bit of a conversation about it afterwards in terms of professionalism, etc. (I wasn’t really offended—again, students are going to bitch about you. It’s part of the job description.) But after this initial little conflict, this Friend Requester and I had built up a solid, respectful, working relationship.



Then during my last semester, and actor quit a show with six rehearsals to go, and I was asked to step into the role so that, you know, the show could go on. And the Friend Requester was working as the stage manager. The show was a bit controversial—it was a nighttime, outdoor, agit-prop kind of production—and it included a sex scene with my counterpart in the rumored affair. (Remember, though, that at this point, I was oblivious to the existence of said rumor.) Now, I believe you gotta do what you gotta do in the name of art. And the script called for a kind of an ugly, animalistic, almost-sex scene. (With no kissing.) So that’s what the show got. After lots of awkward blocking and rehearsal, the scene was eventually intense and brutal and what the script required.



Now that being said, it wasn’t easy for me to do. At all. I mean, for all of my self-exposure and radical honesty and la la la, I’m not an exhibitionist. (At all.) So I wasn’t exactly eager to have people watch me, you know, with my slip up around my waist as I pull a man in between my legs. I mean, while I love and take delight in my body, I’m also really twitchy about presenting it in any way might connote “spectacle”, which let’s face it, a fat girl in a full slip in a kind of savage, outdoor sex scene…that’s not something people get to see everyday. There’s some serious spectacle in there, which made me feel really, really vulnerable.



And of course, being a female professor, there was a risk in playing that role that I don’t think any of the students could fully appreciate—basically, that it can be hard to for a woman to maintain her authority once people have seen her flat on her back with a man on top of her. And that risk wouldn’t have been the same for a man. And after the first performance, I was shaky with all the endorphins, and I just wanted to find a place to hide out for a second until the audience left. (It was outside, after all.) So I make a beeline for a van that was parked near the performance space while the audience milled around and said hi to other cast members. And as I’m ducking into the van, I hear this male student calling out to me, “Hey, Lulu! Hi!” And I just wave my hand and say hi and don’t really look over because I felt crazy exposed and just. Had. To. Get. Into. The. Van. But the student kept trying to talk to me, saying, “Hey, good show! I mean, really good show…” And I heard it…there was kind of a leer in his voice. It was demeaning.  And it made me feel kind of sick.



But as an artist and an educator, modeling artistic integrity for my performance students is really important to me, and I wasn’t going to try to sway the production into a watered-down version just for my own comfort level, or just so I could avoid risk. It was important to be true to the production in spite of the personal risk and exposure. Because there is no good art without risk. And no good performers without vulnerability. But the thing that I think people often don’t realize is that just because I’m good at vulnerability, that doesn’t make it easy for me.



So in light of all of that exposure and risk and junk, I took the Friend Requester aside as soon as we began blocking the sex scene. We talked about how this was really good stage management training, since stage managers have to learn how to deal with very sensitive and charged material with respect and professionalism. And I talked to her about what a delicate process it was working with sexually charged material—how it makes the actors really vulnerable and exposed, so it’s especially important to respect that vulnerability. We talked about how awkward and uncomfortable rehearsing sex blocking can be and that it is absolutely critical that what happens in the room during the rehearsals—embarrassing accidents, freak-outs, wardrobe malfunctions, whatever—never leaves the rehearsal room.



And she looked me right in the face and said, “Of course. I completely understand. Absolutely nothing will leave the room.”



And then when I got hit by the affair rumor tidal wave, I found out that the Friend Requester used the sex scene rehearsals as “evidence” of the affair and spread the stories like wildfire. I was really honest with her about how awkward and sensitive working a scene like that was, and I genuinely asked her to respect that, and she lied right to my face. Absolutely shamelessly. Now that’s cold.



And that’s the kind of thing that I don’t know if I can just blow off with a “Well, a year has gone by now…” Because yeah, a year has gone by now, and I don’t feel the pain of the rumor anymore. I own it, and I can talk about it. I can even joke about it now that I understand that it is an occupational hazard. But I don’t know if the right thing to do—for me or for her—is to condone that kind of malicious gossiping by saying that now we’re “friends”. Then again, I also don’t know if it’s my ethical obligation to jump back into that mess to explain to her what she did and why it was so wrong. She’s young—she could learn something important from it. But then again, she’s young—she could just refuse to accept responsibility.
And I don’t want any of that. I don’t want any more mess. And I don’t want to go into an ethical quandary every time I logon to Facebook and see the Friend Requester’s friend request sitting there, staring at me. So I have to make some kind of choice just to get the request off my frickin’ page.
Because really, all I want when I go on Facebook is to look at pictures of my friends, and read the sassy comments they make to me, and make sassy comments in return. And maybe, maybe, if someone loves me a whole bunch, or if I’ve been really good around Christmas, someone will have posted a video on my Wall of ducklings swimming in a bathtub.
Now really, is that too much to ask?