I lost it somewhere between the poetry reading and the strip club

and in all honesty, what “it” is i'm still not exactly sure.

The poetry reading necessitated a forty minute train ride into brooklyn. I wrongly anticipated a cerebral set. Instead, the ironic, subversive thirty year olds of bushwick were gathered to sit on the floor and snap for phrases like “tall, tall mountain” and pair crocks with midi skirts. They have the stage presence of the middle schoolers my mom directs- their cracking, apologetic voices dampened still by their need to fidget with their pants. Their bodies are their temples, their subjects, and something i'm supposed to care about as well i guess. The prose is hinting at a traumatic sexual encounter so in good faith I can not recognize that its boring. Everything is equal parts new age provocateur but parentally redeemable, and their faces are buried into their scripts in their notes app. In the last ten minutes, she turns to god, and thank god I conveniently crave smoke. I grab a pen and paper and am compelled outside for some lonely rational thought and personal honest takes. Annoyingly proud, as always, of my dissenting voice, only to find out that her book is to be published next month. Mental note to stop being such a bitch all the time.

Feeling nauseatingly bohemian and in need of familiar Manhattan soil, i call my lady in red. I can count on the reality that meeting up with keeley past ten pm means im about to get up to some fuckshit. And that we do, the three of us turning up moments later at a promoters table in a strip club. 

I'm no stranger to this scene, please, i've watched hustlers. What is strange is that after befriending the dancers and sharing our names and ages, I realize for the first time in a long time that i am on the older end of the spectrum. I hear the words “seven years of experience” and wish i wasn't capable of mental subtraction. I feel maternal towards the immediate image of a thirteen year old who already knows that her body is worth something fiscal. The night has now taken a more solemn and austere mood, but it is easy still to dance enough to be shepherded into the vip lounge with a new sad man, and easiest of all is pocketing the singles that get slipped into my top. 

I understand the implications of the setting and what my presence contributes. I understand the vile reality of female vulnerability and male fantasy. I understand that there are fears for safety and danger. But it must also be acknowledged that I too might be capable of producing danger. I am unkissed and untouched, and i exit into the night wealthier than i started. I think to myself: would Joan Didion ever go to a strip club?

The “hard” part of the excursion doesn't come until the morning. As these things so often go- i inspect every new bruise and mark that covers my legs. I shove my swollen toes back into heels and begin what looks like a walk of shame, made even more pathetic by my knowledge of its true sexlessness. The damp morning feels subliminal, like the purest nature I have ever experienced, fully exposed to the elements.

My mom isn’t going to like this one, nor will any future employers, and Jesus probably doesnt either- but i ordered a latte this morning and was given black tea so in a way i think god has already facilitated my repenting of my sins.