AN UNCERTAIN AGE INDEED (Kali, You Go!*)


I received exactly two birthday cards this year (Plate One, left).







Apparently I am straddling the thin line between one of Tom Wolfe's smirking puberteens and perimenopausal scary lady with crazy hair and lopsided breasts. As with that whole virgin/whore dichotomy thrust on us by The Man, it seems there is no middle ground.

This makes me want to fall on my sword.

So does the aftermath of the weird dream I had about a brilliant professor I had (classes with) some 20-plus years ago (by the time I was a senior he'd fled our stuffy liberal arts school, where the professors were far more radical than the students; one time in class it was apparent that no one had done their work and he said "You've all been drinking and fucking all weekend" and told us to leave. They weren't really ready for that in Lake-not-Wake Forest, were they?). In any case, I awakened and remembered what promise I once had --yes, perhaps I couldda been a contenda -- and what a moron** and underacheiver*** I've become. So much for that dream of making groundbreaking films about youth subcultures. Maybe next lifetime.


Yes, time to fall on the sword.

Or at least try to learn how to wield the thing and become the castrating crone (in sensible shoes) I'm meant to be.



------------------------


*Kali-Yuga
In Hinduism, the last of the four yugas (ages) that make up one cycle of creation is the one we're in right now -- The Kali-Yuga. It's characterized by wickedness and disaster, and leads up to the destruction of this world (usually by men, at the expense of women) in preparation for a new creation and new cycle of yugas. Apparently The Man is going to get his soon, once Kali comes.**** She's the angry naked blue goddess with the crazy hair, sword, Gene Simmons tongue and string of skulls, who is usually depicted stomping her husband to death (oops!).

**I really did take great pleasure in watching Kristin-the-Famous-Bugeyed-Yoga-Teacher say "shit" and "fuck" (bleeped out of course) and drink, at one sitting: red wine, a martini and coffee -- on tonight's final episode of Hooking Up.

***No insurance, no mortgage, no Relationship, no five-year Plan, not a single lux-ur-ee. Footloose and fancy-free. No wonder I keep attracting guys like me.

****My mother, who was always ahead of her time and subscribed to Ms. from day one (I'm more of a Bitch girl myself, if you hadn't guessed), loved that bumper sticker; "God is Coming -- and is She Pissed!" NOW I finally get it.