The start of my romance novel

I wrote this awhile ago and then stopped. But I like it! Maybe I should keep going.

~~~

You could use the cabin, but there were rules.

No one could sit in Grandpa Gabe’s armchair, for example. Never mind that the old man hadn’t been well enough to get up to Shaw Island in years. Fear of his disapproval lurked inside  cabinets you weren’t allowed to reorganize, on bookshelves with the first aid kit from 1965 that could never be replaced, and even in the bathroom where the ancient towels were as stiff as Grandpa’s upper lip. You could exfoliate while drying off. A deal, really.

The Norwich family had owned the property for three generations. The rules of the first still dictated the ways of the last, in an almost patriotic, constitutionally loyal way. Because these unspoken regulations hung around the cabin like a cloud of stale smoke (but not really because no smoking), the fortunate consequence was that you never wanted to be inside.

You wanted to be where the salty wind tightened your skin and your breathing naturally synced with the velvet lapping of the waves on the shores. “I’m going for a walk” meant running your hands over the soft feather moss that embraced old growth trees and padding through the deer trails to discover secret clandestine glens in the woods. There was an intoxicating calmness, a stillness that both held the promise of tranquility and swelled with possibility.

That was why Helen was headed to her family’s cabin. She needed to be outside.

The universe seemed to punish her for speeding through Everett, not only with a patronizing ticket from a tongue-clicking cop, but with hours of traffic fighting through Burlington until the turn-off. Then, finally free to fly down the 20 toward Anacortes, her gas light went on. She spilled gasoline on her shoes and had to drive with the windows down for the final half hour, occasionally gagging at the fumes.

The anxiety around making the ferry from Anacortes was also inherited – more yelling, fighting, and spanking happened in the Norwich family surrounding the frantic journey to the Anacortes ferry terminal than during all the other holidays put together. This time Helen’s urgency was her own, a thumping in her veins, every deep breath a battle with her own ribs. Her true crime podcast detailed the discovery of a suitcase filled with body parts and the clock on the dash ticked closer to the ferry departure time.

After a very questionable and supremely illegal turn, Helen’s Honda rumbled into the line for the toll both.

“You’re supposed to get in line forty-five minutes to an hour before departure time,” chided the exhausted tooth booth attendant.

Is it just me or does no one like anything I do? Helen thought.

“I’m sorry, traffic.”

“Where you headed?”

“Shaw Island.”

The attendant nodded and visibly relaxed. Shaw Island was the smallest of the four big islands in the San Juan archipelago, huddled in the cold northern waters of Washington state. Its year-round population was 170. There was no gas station. There was no pizza delivery. There was no downtown. More importantly, there was rarely anyone in the ferry line.

“Shaw Island, lane 15.”

“Thank you, sorry!”

Dropping her smile, Helen pulled away from the toll booth and rolled down lane 15, passing Subarus laden with bikes and camping equipment and hulking pick-up trucks with tinted windows and American flag stickers. Two cars sat ahead of her, a beat-up chocolate colored Turino and a work truck with mounds of dirt and rocks in the bed. Shaw was so remote, you had to go to the mainland for rocks and dirt.

“Attention,” the fuzzy announcement blared over the ferry lanes, “the three-forty-five to Lopez and Shaw will be one hour late. The three-forty-five will be one hour late to Lopez and Shaw. Thank you.”

Sure.

Helen squeezed out of her car, careful not to hit the Tesla in the lane for Orcas Island. Coffee and a hot dog. Necessary.

She walked to the cafe in the ferry terminal.

It was closed.

She walked back to her car.

“It’s closed.”

It took Helen a moment to figure out who was speaking to her. The warm, musical voice belonged to the driver of the dirt and rocks truck. She was laying back in the front seat with her work boots sticking out the window. Black curls escaped her trucker’s hat. 

“Yeah, thanks,” said Helen. “I noticed.”

“There’s a couple vending machines on the other side of the lanes.”

Helen knew this. “Oh yeah?” 

“But the card reader’s broken, so you need cash.”

Helen did not know this. “Oh.”

The driver slow grinned. “You don’t got any?”
“No.”

The driver shifted in her seat, digging her hand into the back pocket of her jeans.

“You don’t have to, I’m alright,” Helen said quickly.

The driver ignored her protest and reached out with a five dollar bill. Her green and black flannel sleeve was rolled up past the elbow, revealing intricate botany tattoos. “Want it?”

Helen took the soft wrinkled bill. It was warm. “Thank you…”

“Ingrid.”

“Ingrid. I’m Helen.”

“Hi Helen. You live on Shaw?”

“No. Just staying for awhile. You?”
“Doing a landscaping job at a fancy house near Parks Bay.”

“Sounds nice.”

“It can be, yeah.”

It occurred to Helen that Ingrid had brown eyes and that she hadn’t stopped staring into them. Helen glanced down at the money in her hand. She thought she heard Ingrid make an amused huff.

“Well don’t spend it all in one place, Helen.”

“Oh I absolutely will.” Helen walked away in what she imagined was nonchalance.

After fighting the vending machine for her bounty, Helen hurriedly retreated back to her car, suddenly realizing how ravenous she was. Her hands fumbled ripping open the plastic surrounding a candy bar and popping a bag of Fritos. She crammed corn chips into her mouth, making little moans of ecstasy as she chewed too many at once. Even while shaking with the excitement of junk food, she found herself glancing up at Ingrid’s truck in front of her. She could still see Ingrid’s boots out the window. 

And then…

Did…Ingrid just tilt her rearview mirror to look back at her?

Helen sucked the salt off her lips. Yes, she definitely saw two brown eyes in the mirror. They crinkled with a grin.

~~

Helen didn’t want to leave her car once she drove onto the ferry. She was starting to lose adrenaline and she also didn’t want to have any awkward interactions with Ingrid. It was a relief when the driver got out of her car immediately and headed up to the deck.

It was weird that she didn’t even look at Helen, though.

Why wouldn’t she at least look back? Helen was parked right behind her, she had just given her five bucks. Even a meaningless smile and a casual wave would have been totally socially acceptable without inviting further conversation. So Helen was a little awkward, who the hell wouldn’t be? She probably thought Helen was stuck up or ungrateful and totally regretted giving her any money. But you know what, this total stranger had no idea what Helen had been through up until that moment, so honestly, how dare she make any sort of assumption about her!

And now Helen had to pee. Of course.

This was typical. Just typical.

Despite the very full ferry, she would probably run into Ingrid upstairs and they’d have some furtive eye catching. Helen would roll her eyes, knowing this was silly, and offer to buy Ingrid a cup of coffee. Helen would notice that, against type, Ingrid liked a lot of cream and sugar in hers. They’d hold their warm drinks and stroll up and down the length of the boat, learning about each other. They both would think that One Thing was so funny and if you liked that, then have you heard of that one show? Yes! Wasn’t it amazing! They’d finish their coffee and Ingrid would offer to lend Helen her copy of that book that she happened to bring with her. So they would walk down to the car deck and giggle about how the huge side-view mirror of that red truck made it awkward opening the passenger door. Ingrid would then walk around to the driver’s side and lean over the seat, her jeans tightening over her ass as she reached for the book, and when she turned around, smelling like leather and vanilla, Helen would be there, and before they knew it, Helen’s fingers would be entwined in those midnight curls and the trucker hat would fall to the floor of the car and Ingrid’s warm palm would slide up her shirt and press into the small of her back-

“Attention passengers. We are now arriving at Shaw Island. Drivers, please return to your vehicles.”

Helen gasped, jostled out of her fantasy.

Reality Ingrid was getting back into her car. She didn’t look back at Helen.

Fantasy Ingrid wrote her cell number on Helen’s arm and slowly kissed her wrist before winking and sauntering away.

Helen exhaled.

~~

Twilight cast its purple haze on the sky by the time Helen turned off the paved road onto the family property. The tall grasses and nettles had overtaken the driveway and hadn’t been mowed or disturbed yet – a sign no one had opened the cabin this season. With renewed determination, she rumbled her car down the driveway, grimacing at the screeching of her undercarriage.

The cabin lay waiting at the end of the road. It was a simple wooden box, two stories tall with a few dark windows. It was surrounded by dark forest, the only sounds were trees rustling and the persistent slapping of waves against rocks as the tide fought its way in.

Dancing with the desperate need to urinate, she used the flashlight on her cell phone to rummage for the ring of keys hidden in a statue of a seagull. The darkness didn’t matter, nothing had moved, nothing had changed. In a trance, she turned on the electricity and the water pump. She cleared cobwebs. She plugged in the fridge. She found the plastic tubs with bedding in the shed, easily overcoming the trick door that you had to lift slightly before sliding it open. It was rote.

Finally, she laid down and now, being unable to compartmentalize any longer, knowing there was no one to hear for miles, opened her mouth and allowed herself to cry.

It was dusk when Helen woke up. She’d sobbed into the pillow for what seemed like hours before finally falling asleep, face down in the pillow and waking up to a pillow damp with tears and drool. She couldn’t tell whether it was the dim purple and grey hues of twilight that made it so difficult to see, or the puffiness in her eyes, but she reached groggily for the bedside lamp, smacking the cotton-feel out of her mouth. 

She drew herself up to standing, every muscle in her body throbbing dully as the stress she’d been struggling so hard to hold at bay finally broke free. She closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath through her nose, holding it for a count of four before slowly releasing through her mouth as her therapist had taught her to do. And as she did so, she scraped together the memories of the day, the memories of the Romesco case, of Maritza walking out the door with their dog, Sylvia under her arm, dragging her suitcase behind her, and buried them deep. And when these memories refused to fit into the mental closet she’d shoved them into, she bricked over the door. This, her therapist had not taught her to do. 

But whatever. Her therapist was not here. She could deal with this in whatever way she chose. And she chose… Garbage. 

A Traditional Peter Pan

First! History!

In my solo show Bread Crumbs, wherein I talk about how I discovered I was nonbinary and what that journey looked like for me as a 33-year-old cishet married “woman” with three-year-old twins, I describe what I call my, well, bread crumbs. Bread crumbs are the trail of “aha moments” that you didn’t know were aha moments, but when you look back, they lead you home to your true self. I was always this way; here is the evidence of my truth before I was socialized to forget or suppress it.

One of my bread crumb moments was when I was six years old. My mother took me alone into New York City to see a Broadway show. This was a big deal because both my siblings were born by this point and as the oldest, it was special to have time alone with her. We drove into Manhattan, stayed overnight in her apartment on W 71st Street (she was a soap star and this was her work pad), had club sandwiches for dinner, and saw Cathy Rigby as Peter Pan.

We had front row mezzanine seats. I swear Cathy flew up and practically landed on the railing. I know that that’s not true, but it felt that way to me. This show blew my mind. This show rocked my world. This show made me want to do theatre.

But it was also a nonbinary bread crumb.

Here was this…. woman playing a boy. A woman boy? A boy woman? Sorta neither. Sorta both. Genderbent, carefree, charming, and sweet and vulnerable and tough and a leader and HE CAN FLY, HE CAN FLY, HE CAN FLY!

Even at six years old, I knew I wanted to be that. I wanted to be all of that.

Bread crumb.

For years after, I would watch and rewatch the Mary Martin production on VHS, but Cathy is my Peter.

Bzzzzzztttttttt fast forward.

There have been a few other major productions of this show, but not many — the show is mostly relegated to regional and nonprofessional productions (who either have Peter and the kids run around on the ground making whooshing noises like Freakazoid or fly them unsafely to disastrous effect). They even made a play about this, haha.

But beyond the technical problems of mounting this show, Peter Pan had a bigger problem. Its mind-bogglingly racist book. I mean, 1954 really went for it. White people playing non-white people, made-up words, face paint and feathers, fringe, “war dances” and the hand-flapping-over-mouth sounds — the musical jumped the racist-ass shark more than the Disney cartoon, which, honestly, was already several great whites deep. Unproducable by any standard.

So thank the ever-loving-stars Larissa FastHorse was hired and accepted the opportunity to rewrite it.

I was very excited when they announced this tour. I had avoided showing the Disney film and the Mary Martin recording to my kids because while of course I have already had many conversations about representation and how it can help or hurt people, Peter Pan’s representations of indigenous people are particularly egregious. It’s different than watching The Sandlot and saying, “Yeah, back then saying that you threw like a girl was a legit insult because everyone thought girls were bad at sports” and then continuing the movie. With Peter Pan, you’d be stopping the film every 10 minutes, feels like.

So when the tour dates were announced, my spouse, knowing how this show has affected my life, bought tickets for the whole family. About a month before our tickets, I saw that they had hired a man to play Peter Pan. Usually this role is played by a woman. I was immediately disappointed, but I thought, hey, let’s see what happens.

So now I’ve seen what happens, haha. And here’s the review.

Considering I am nonbinary. Considering I founded and run a theatre company whose fulcrum rests on nontraditional casting and queering the canon. Considering my views about gender being a social construct. Considering all this, the following statement is going to sound surprising, BUT

It turns out I am a traditionalist.

I do not think Peter Pan should be played by a man.

Thank you for coming to my Processing.

Let us first do the traditional (because remember I am a STAUNCH traditionalist) Things I Enjoyed section.

Sets were great — it was an updated homage to the backyard Let’s Put On a Play vibe of the original. Wendy’s house was still adorable. The Darling house whimsically disappeared into the night as the children fly away. The Tinkerbell magic was fun and clever. The forests of Neverland were lifted from a child’s imagination with hidden forts and everything made out of vines. Things smoked. Things lit up. Stage magic abounded.

I was absolutely DELIGHTED they kept the crocodile as an actor in a suit just crawling around on the ground. Exactly as it should be. I miss the kangaroo and the ostrich, but I get it. I wonder if because this production was specifically built to tour, they didn’t cheap out like some tours do. I’m a bit of an anti-projectionist (#tradguy), but I didn’t mind it because it wasn’t the centerpiece of the set.

We love a live orchestra — musicians were excellent, the conductor was so passionate, even from the balcony you felt him do that quick intake breath thing before his arms powerfully gave a downbeat. Great band!

Most importantly, Larissa FastHorse’s new book really really works. I read in the article I linked earlier that she didn’t want to highlight any particular Native American tribe, but indigenous peoples from all over the world who show up at Neverland to preserve their cultures until it’s safe to go back. I don’t think I fully understood that from the script, but admittedly the sound was not great and a lot of lines were garbled. Either way, Tiger Lily’s arc is brilliantly woven in. She’s seamlessly part of the story in a way that feels organic, earned, and wholly welcomed. I loved the choreography, I loved the costumes, I loved the added characters. Brava.

Another big change is that the script modernizes the Darlings. Wendy has a YouTube channel, there are smart phones, Mr. Darling looks like he works for Google. I kinda wish that modernizing this story did more for the show than just give it the ability to make modern technology jokes (although Liza’s bits were hilarious), but to be honest, other than me being surprised by it, it was fine. My theatre company just did Peter and the Starcatcher where we modernized the bookends of the show as well. However, unlike this production, we do not have the luxury of being able to change the script, so we had to justify these changes story-wise. Since the tour could change whatever words they wanted to justify this choice, I wish it had more in there.

Thankfully they cut the weeeeeiiiirrrrdddddddddd mysterious lady number from the original. I won’t even describe it. Just… look it up, haha.

All and all, I laughed, I got teary, and I gasped when Peter burst through the windows shedding fairy dust. When I glanced around at the audience, both adults and children had wide eyes and big smiles. Peter barely had to ask us to believe in fairies, people’s cheers and applause drowned him out immediately. This is why we do theatre. You just don’t get that anywhere else.

And now it’s time for the soap box.

My big problem with this tour is the casting of Peter Pan. Nolan Almeida was not it for me. I think it might be partially this tour’s direction of Peter as a character, but ultimately, I do not think casting a man in this role works.

Yes, me, who champions nontraditional casting, who revels in theatrical reboots, who smugly proclaims that musicals aren’t museums — I could. Not. Get. Over it.

I’m trying hard to determine whether my gay agenda is showing and that’s why I’m so insistent that this casting be genderbent, or whether a more child-like man could actually convince me he deserves to fly.

I guess I always saw a woman playing Peter as so deliciously subversive that by casting this show with an actual dude, we strip it of the queer undertones that makes this show so intriguing — Peter Pan is a puckish anti-establishment sprite. Why should he be as straight (har har) forward as being a cis man? What’s the fun in that? Why in the name of progress did they decide to change arguably the most progressive thing about this musical?

In the Playbill article, FastHorse says the concern was that it would be very confusing to children to see someone who looked like a girl, but people kept referring to as a boy. “‘We’re fortunately raising children to have a much broader understanding of gender, so we can’t just pretend it doesn’t exist anymore,’ FastHorse says. ‘I think it’s deeply irresponsible to pretend gender isn’t there.'”

… what?

First of all, having a “broader understanding of gender” actually ALLOWS for children to understand that what you *look like* doesn’t dictate your gender.

Second, this is a weird argument. Is she saying that it is actually more progressive to cast Peter Pan as a man because otherwise we are saying men don’t exist…? Somehow the backward transphobic children of the 1950s accepted that Mary Martin was Peter Pan and still there are men (boy are there). My guess is so too would the skibidi children of today accept that a woman or an AFAB¹ nonbinary person could play a character who used he/him pronouns. I mean, god I fucking hope so, otherwise that’s a real bummer for me and a lot of my friends.

The fact is, gender isn’t that big of a deal. It’s just more politically rife to say it is.

It’s why we can say that the founding fathers were all cis men even though they wore tights, wigs, and make-up. No one thinks they were women. Conservatives who lap up MAGA and Christian nationalist bullshit do not think Thomas Jefferson was a trans woman because he wore rouge. Somehow they understand that. And I guarantee you they watched a lady play Peter Pan and didn’t think Peter was a girl.

Why?

Because people actually understand all this “gender stuff” better than they want to admit. When you don’t turn it into a political football, all this “gender stuff” isn’t actually a big deal. This is why this show has been beloved for half a century with a grown woman playing Peter Pan, a patently eternal boy, and I haven’t ever heard a single pearl-clutching, hand-wringing Helen Lovejoy bitch about it.

Because Helen knows it’s not a big deal. She might pretend she doesn’t know. But she does know.

Now I don’t know that I care to cater to the Helen Lovejoys. So let’s talk about the patrons who are down to clown. Let’s talk about patrons who are either socially progressive, don’t care, or are content to know that this is a make-believe show literally about make-believe and that there isn’t actually a crocodile on stage, but the Smee cover in a lizard suit riding a skateboard on their belly.

(I have no idea if it’s actually the Smee cover, but it made me laugh, so I refuse to fact check it.)

Here’s the thing — the original production unwittingly threw us a bone here and has given us permission to genderbend this role. As someone who has to continually beg licensing houses to allow me to use nontraditional casting, I cannot tell you what a boon this is. In Peter Pan, the usual suspects who you think might complain about something like this have already been neutralized. So it’s weird to me that they chose to cast this with a man out of the concern that it would be confusing *to the more open-minded audience members.*

Frankly, this tour’s casting fundamentally changes this show in ways that actually enforce traditional Western gender roles more than the original 1953 casting. A lot of it has to do with how it effects Peter’s relationship to Wendy.

Original Wendy is a child playing dress up at the top of the show. She is approaching adulthood, but she does not want to grow up and leave the nursery. Classic cusp of adulthood stuff.

Sidebar, I just realized — Spring Awakening was written before Peter Pan, but I wonder if J.M. Barrie took the name Wendy from Wendla? Or maybe just a coincidence.

In the new book, Wendy is a more actualized human being. They gave her A Thing to be obsessed with beyond being a mommy– she wants to be a surgeon — which is appreciated because Original Wendy is kind of a simpering idiot. The bigger departure from the original, however, is that Reboot Wendy can’t WAIT to grow up. She wants her own room, she wants to be in charge. She is also more flirty with Peter in a pre-teen modern way as opposed to Original Wendy, a repressed Edwardian girl who probably won’t know what sex is until her wedding night.

Original Wendy’s crush on Peter is about as clueless as he is. She knows what a kiss is, but you get the feeling that that’s about it. It’s still “playing” at being a grown-up. Reboot Wendy is a little more modern woman forward.

So now we have Reboot Peter. Instead of watching a slow awakening that’s a little bit gay — what really draws Wendy to Peter? Does she even understand it? — we’re watching a 20-something-year-old man with a five o’clock shadow, who is acting more like he’s selling papes and evading Mr. Sullivan, continually reject and (maybe purposefully?) misunderstand Reboot Wendy, who’s coming in hot. It reeks of cishet puberty.

Watching this, I wanted to say, “Wendy. Gurl. He’s just not that into you.” instead of “Here are two kids who don’t understand their feelings yet.”

This is where I wonder if Almeida needed to bring a little more childishness into his portrayal, or whether he was directed to be more of a pre-teen and less of a boy, or whether, again, I just think this shit should be gay.

An example:

During the classic, “Boy, why are you crying?” scene, Wendy reaches out to touch Peter or hug Peter, I don’t remember.

“No one must ever touch me!” demands Peter.

“Why?” asks Wendy with genuine curiosity.

Mary Martin version: Peter, suddenly smiling and dropping all seriousness, quips a surprised, “I dunno!” as if he actually has no idea why he said that.

Ah! The audience thinks: a silly game with made-up rules not fully understood even by the child making them up! The original script and show is FULL of these moments. The rules of Neverland are as ephemeral as the whim of the mercurial sprite who speaks them to life.

This new Peter Pan eschews all of that.

In the new version, we have the same dialogue, but in the delivery of the final line, Reboot Peter gives a half Greaser shrug and low grumbles a moody, “I dunno.”

GOD, chicks, amirite?

There is now a teenage surliness that, yes, could be tempered if delivered by a person who had not been through a testosterone puberty — something that they were apparently concerned about in casting, but ended up ignoring. But this also could be fixed with direction/actor interpretation.

So now we are not only doubling down on the original “girls mature faster than boys” trope, but we enter Man Wants Freedom, Woman is Ball and Chain territory, made even more pronounced since these characters are now being played by a man and woman.

Unfortunately, for me, once I saw this interplay, everything else sort of fell into those society gender traps and it took away the magic for me. When Peter is a genderbent character, it is easier to put aside those socialized tropes and stereotypes because what we are watching does not fit that. Society doesn’t have a stereotype for women boys/boy women/sorta neither/sorta both.

On top of that, Mary Martin and Cathy Rigby really infused their interpretations of Peter with child-like wonder. I believed Peter didn’t know what a kiss was. I believed Peter thought soap (or lotion in the rewrite) would make a shadow stick to him. So now he’s just an idiot teenage boy, which has its own comedy to it, but it starts to become weaponized incompetence that still requires Wendy to teach him. In the original, I believed Peter always wanted to be a little boy and have fun. I could suspend my disbelief that an adult was playing a child because no other part of who Peter is “supposed” to be was represented by the actor.

It meant he could be anything.

1. Yeah. I know. I hate this phrase too. But I don’t know how else to say it. ↩︎

#StarBugs

I watched the original trilogy with my kids last winter when we were snowed in for a week. Today we watched The Force Awakens and half of The Last Jedi.

I am overwhelmed with the world right now, so I decided to compile their commentary in order while they watched.

February 2019

A New Hope

• The girls are concerned about Jawa morals.
• “He cut off his arm?!”
  “Yeah, to protect Luke.”
  “…and that’s okay?!”
• Now that they’re both in Storm Trooper uniforms, the girls cannot tell Luke and Han apart. #fair
• “Dark Vader.”
• They’re singing “R2D2” to the tune of Frere Jacques over the Death Star Planning Meeting.
• “He left his cape!” #RIPBen
• “What?! He can’t talk if he died!”
• About the Death Star: “How can they see the good guys if there’s no glass?”
• We did it! They watched A New Hope and (with me answering questions every 5 minutes) they understood what was going on and really liked it! Empire is tomorrow.

  It’s all going as planned! I had worried about them getting besmirched by people who believe in the prequels before I had a chance to indoctrinate them into the Holy Trilogy. But the Force is with me. Always.

Empire Strikes Back

• re: Hoth “That’s where we are!” #snowpocalypse
• “You said this movie will have Yoga.”
  “Yoga will be here soon.”
• “They need to use that taun taun to keep warm.”
  “Are they going to cuddle?”
  “…yes.”
• “Yeah, you scruffy noofer!”
• “Luke doesn’t need to be careful; he has the force. And also that helmet, where he can’t see.”
• “Do you want to show Daddy how you use the force?”
  “NO! I want it to be a secret.”
• They are completely silent and enthralled watching Yoda.
• “Take you to him, I will.”
  “HE’S LYING! HE IS YODA! HE’S LYING!”
• After Han and Leia kiss: “I guess they’re both gonna get dirty.”
• They are arguing about what kinds of circles they can make with their hands while Yoda makes his “the force is life” speech.
• AHHHH they wanted to stop JUST after Darth Vader showed up in Cloud City because they’re starting to lose focus and we probably won’t keep going tonight. DAMN! It’s so good, though!
• Cheerfully: “Well if Luke dies, he’ll get to see Obi Wan Kenobi!” “Yeah! He’ll just use the force to talk!”
• Me: Darth Vader isn’t a good man.
  Vivi: I still like him though.

  They have no idea what’s coming and I’m so exciiiite

• “The Force is like having extra legs!”
  “And extra eyes! And ears! And hands!”
  “And mouth!”
• “He has to choose to be a mean son?!”
  “But he doesn’t want to!”
• When Leia turned around: “YES!! IT WORKED!!”
• “I guess they can just glue it back on.”
• Woo! Best ending to a movie EVER. The bugs’ take-aways:
  “It’s hard to be with a mean father. A mean father is bad.”
  “So if you’re a good guy with a mean guy as a dad… *shrug* It doesn’t work.”
  “I like when Luke chose to be a good guy.”

Return of the Jedi

 

• “This is the one with the bears, right?”
• They are arguing over Vader’s choice of wearing a black cape. They just don’t find it fashionable. Vivien didn’t like that it was black and Abigail, while disapproving of the cape, didn’t mind the color.
• Skeptically, at 3PO and R2 approaching Jabba’s Palace, “*They* are the only ones going to save him?”
• Hard pass on Bib Fortuna, haha
• They are freaked out by Jabba. He throws good people in jail, he eats live animals, he bought Chewy (“he’s not a toy!”).
• Luke enters in his Jedi robe. “Why is he funny?”
• “Why is there a chain around her neck?” “Because he’s treating her like an animal.” “HE is an animal.”
• “What? I thought he had a blue sword!”
• “She defeated him!” “…but now she’s naked.”
• As they leave Tattooine, “Okay, but where are the bears?”
• Abigail can’t get over that Luke’s face might still be in Vader’s helmet.
• “Leia’s his sister! Now she can sleep at his house!”
• “Yoda?! I’ve been calling him Yoga!”
• *a ship hissing* “Is that someone peeing?!”
• They don’t like the word “Ewok,” though. “I don’t live in the movie, so I can just call them bears, right?”
• While Luke asks Leia about her mother: “Do you know when YOUR mom is going to die?”
• “He took Luke’s lightsaber without asking because he is a mean guy.”
• “Was Darth Vader’s mom mean? Is that why he’s mean?”
• “Do the bad guys not know how to swing on vines?”
• “Luke should be calm and not angry he should breathe in and breathe out.”
• They are wayyy over this lengthy fight sequence, haha
• “Luke isn’t getting better at being a bad guy.”
• When the Emperor electrocutes Luke: “Oh man.”
• “Use the Force to call your friends!”
• After Vader saves Luke: “He loves him!” “He realized he loves him!”
• “But if they defeat the Death Star, then Dark Vader will be gone too.” “He better give him a good bye hug.”
• “Now they’re all his dads!” “He has three dads!”
• “For the rest of the Star Wars, will they still be dancing?”
• They are writing fan fiction about Luke and his three dads (astral Yoda, Obi Wan, and Anakin).

One year later, we did Force Awakens!

March 2020

• “Wait, so that droid is named PBJ?” #BB8
• Referring to Finn’s bloody helmet:
  “Is he the saddest?”
• “Yay! Chewawa!”
  “…who’s that?”
  “That’s Han Solo!”
  “…why doesn’t he look like him?”
• They are GAGGED that Kylo is Han’s son.
• After they enter Moz’s cantina: “There are a lot of goopy persons.”
• When the X-Wings come on: “Hey! I recognize those ships! Those are Luke’s friends!”
• “Rey has the force because she touched Luke’s lightsaber and got nightmares.”
• “Ugh. Where is Luke already?”
• These bugs do not care about Leia/Han at ALL and I’m sniffling like an idiot.
• “He could have just blown up the bridge! He could have just killed someone he didn’t love!”
• Can Luke still talk to Han Solo? Like he talks to Yoda?”
• “Why doesn’t anyone go to bed in this show?”
• Kylo: I could teach you!
  “Huh. She doesn’t need him.” “Yeah, he’s the one who doesn’t know!”
• “There are a lot of fires in this movie.”
• “…he doesn’t look like Luke anymore.”
• “I want to watch the next one so that I can get used to Luke.”
  Don’t have to ask me twice.

The Last Jedi

• “Do you think the last jedi is Luke?”
• “Leia is even older now.”
• After Luke throws his saber.
  “WHAT?!”
  “That’s a LIGHTSABER!”
• They now ask whether every new character they see is someone’s father.
• “Ewww!”
  #bluemilk
• “Did he just get that from a butt?!?!”
  I had to stop the movie to explain milking, hahaha
• “Luke Skywalker, I love you, but why are you such a jerk?”
• “He used to walk in the sky. Now he walks in the mountains.”
• “He just doesn’t seem like Luke Skywalker because he doesn’t care about his sword.”
• “Is Luke going to teach her how not to be mad?” “Yeah, that’s the first step.”
• “Kylo Ren is gross. I can smell him through the TV. He looks gross.”
• Abby, balancing on one foot: “Look, Mommy! The force is keeping me up!”
• “The chihuahua horses are free!”

Little Things

I’m writing this instead of writing the musical I’m supposed to be writing.

That’s not true.

I started writing a song and got stuck and took a break. I’m still writing it, I’m just not physically writing it right at this second. Sometimes a song writes itself when you’re not writing it.

I’m really hoping that happens.

I’m writing a gender euphoria song for our main character. It’s turning into a sort of bluesy torch song, which is an entirely different voice for this character and I’m having a hard time deciding whether it is appropriate or not.

I mean, who DOESN’T want a bluesy torch song? But also I don’t want it to be like, “And then the writers wanted a totally unwarranted bluesy torch song.” But it’s post-coming out, so maybe this character needs a new voice to show that?

Childcare is fucking hard. I don’t have family near me and it’s hard. Money aside (which is no small thing), I am in the constant situation of asking someone to help me. I hate that. Maybe that’s what it is. I wish I had the rest of today to work on this song, but I have therapy in 20 minutes and then I have 90 minutes before I have to go pick up the girls. And then that’s it.

I can’t write music when they’re here, at least not really. Because me writing looks like “doing nothing” and “doing nothing” means that I could be doing something for them.

I mean, who I am kidding. “Doing something else” means I could be doing something for them.

Kiss My Aztec: It’s a “No” from Me.

Logo from the photo backdrop

I know it’s been awhile (I literally just read and edited my “About Me!” section for the first time in like 5 years and, uh… yikes), but I have a rant in me, so hello!

One day on facebook, I saw a sizzle reel for a new musical called Kiss My Aztec (Book by John Leguizamo and Tony Taccone, Music by Benjamin Velez, Lyrics by David Kamp, Benjamin Velez, and John Leguizamo) at Berkeley Rep, which included the wry opening number “White People on Boats.” Between that and the interviews with the director, writers, and choreographer, the great reviews — it sounded amazing. It was enough to convince me to take a spur-of-the-moment trip to the Bay Area to see it. I was under the impression that I would be treated to a show that explored Aztec heritage and culture while at the same time mocking and damning colonialism. Sign me up, sez I! A couple of friends and I booked our tickets, secured accommodations, and headed out for a theatre adventure.

Before I launch into what it is I saw, I want to note that the cast is very talented, I enjoyed most of the costumes, I enjoyed the set and the lights, and the band was SMOKIN’. This critique is mostly about the content of the show. In short, I am not a fan. At times I was merely uncomfortable, at times I was offended.

Amazing set by Clint Ramos

And at times I admit I laughed at a well-delivered inbreeding joke.

But for the most part I sat in bewilderment about how a show with a primarily Latinx creative team and cast created this. When I mentioned this to my friends, it was pointed out to me that speaking truth to power comes at a higher cost for POC and so it’s entirely possible that the cast and designers were like, “This sucks, but, hey, it’s the Rep and it’s John Leguizamo, and this is my shot.” It’s entirely possible that they said something and it was ignored. It’s also entirely possible that they all believe in this show and that I, a white person, didn’t find it funny because the humor wasn’t meant for me to get.

Basically I want to acknowledge that I am questioning why I’m offended because I don’t want to do that thing that well-meaning white people do where we get all worked up over shit that isn’t a thing in an effort to be a Good Ally ™.

That all being said… I really think that Kiss My Aztec sucked.

Can You Feel My Heart Saying ‘Hi’?

When I first discovered I was nonbinary, I panicked. I panicked because I didn’t want other people to panic. I didn’t want to be questioned or judged or told it was a phase or not real or me just trying to be trendy. I didn’t want to make it a big deal. I’d just, you know, cut my hair, wear slightly different clothes. Phase out others. No one would need to know why. I’d only use my pronouns with *new* people, people who didn’t know me before. I think I even told people that I didn’t want to make a big deal about it. I wanted it to be a slow reveal, partly because I was still figuring myself out and partly because I didn’t want to be click bait. Look at me! Please like me! Please validate me.

But here’s the thing. The longer I am out, the more I see the cracks in the matrix. In the six months I’ve been out, I’ve been outed multiple times, I’ve been told I’m not trans enough by other trans people, I have been asked skeptical questions about my gender. The more I pretend that this isn’t a big deal, the more that I see that it IS a big deal. It’s a big deal to me.

I keep remembering the song that echoed in my heart in the early days, “Ring of Keys” from Fun Home. Listen to it. It’s about a little girl who sees a butch lesbian for the first time and finally sees a person she identifies with. Even though sexuality and gender are separate things, I still resonated with that moment of recognition. That moment when you see yourself represented in the world and something inside of you feels right. It clicks. “Can you hear my heart saying hi? I know you.”

I’ve decided I want to wear a ring of keys.

My name is Jasmine Joshua. At this time, I identify as a trans nonbinary or transmasculine person. I may always be in the process of figuring my gender out. I use they/them pronouns. I’m new to my community, but I’ve always been a part of it. I’m still learning the language and culture of a group that I didn’t know existed until a few years ago. I am the oldest nonbinary person that I know and sometimes that makes me feel behind or alone or stupid that I didn’t figure it out sooner.

I think it’s important that I am visible, even at personal cost. If this is upsetting/stupid/weird to you, feel free to unfollow me or ask me polite questions in PM. Know that it’s okay to walk away. All I ask is that you’re kind.

Everyone is looking for a kindred spirit and I want to be the person that a stranger of any age sees and says, “Wait. I can do that?”

Yes, you can. And you can do it whenever you want. There is no rush.

Thoughts on “Cat Person”

I started reading “Cat Person” and I’m not even finished and I’m a little disturbed.

I admit that when it first started getting circulated around, I skipped over it because the close up of the two mouths kissing totally grossed me out. Ew, why do I need to be that close to someone else’s wet intimate moment? Yuck. Next.

But then everyone started reading it and what the hell, I’m suseptable to peer pressure so I figured I should read it so I could say that I read it and that I probably agree with whatever feminist #metoo consent is king soap boxing everyone else had already said and probably said it better than me.

I’m a little social media fatigued, is that obvious?

Fact is I was Margot for most of my life as a woman. I was a foolish, naive, obsessed with needing a boyfriend, easily flattered, and went along because what else was I doing? Because that’s what I thought being a woman was supposed to be and since I wasn’t naturally able to be a woman, this is what I came up with. I chased men. I wanted men to love me. I had sex with men to make them love me.

It was horrible. If god forbid I should ever lose M Fox, I will just be alone forever because I fucking hate dating. I hate the players, I hate the game, I hate it all.

Tom was a grad student when I was 19. I forget how I met him. Maybe it was during laundry ping pong. It was my second and final time getting out of an abusive relationship — a relationship with a man who said that he didn’t want to treat me nice because he didn’t want to spoil me. He didn’t want me to get “used to it.” He ignored me in public. He kicked the back of my knees and flat tired me from behind when we walked home. He pinched my nipples when he was angry in private. He had sex with me while I cried over my beloved childhood dog dying. I remember watching it dawn on his face while he humped me that maybe I wasn’t enjoying it. That maybe when I asked him to come over and comfort me that I didn’t mean with his dick. Oh well. Better finish up.

So I guess the only thing that I could offer these men was my body. My woman’s body with soft breasts and legs that opened pretty easily, if you could show me that you loved me. My bar was pretty fucking low.

Then came Tom. I told him about my last relationship, how I was treated, how I felt broken and violated. He was older than me, he was taller than me, he felt like a grown-up. He said he’d take care of me.

Just before Tom penetrated me, he said, “You know I’m with someone else, right?”

“Yeah,” I lied. But then we had sex.

After we were done: “I’m going to break your heart, aren’t I?”

And I loved him. I was in love with him. He healed me, he made me feel dainty and beautiful and wanted.

So when I read “Cat Person,” I see myself in Margot and it is so incredible painful to admit how real that is. Flaws and all. The sad truth? I would have been thrilled to have been chosen by the idiot Robert. I would have been THRILLED to receive a bunch of stupid emojis and a dolphin before I even got him. Even if I hated it.

Because to be alone would have been way way worse.

I wish I had some pithy analysis for this, but I don’t. This story is so realistic and so simple and really punched me in the gut. There are people who are upset because there’s some fat shaming in it, but, honestly, why do we require Margot to be perfect? She’s certainly not the product of a perfect society.

Bread Crumbs

I was 15. I wanted to buzz my hair like Sinead O’Connor. The woman at the salon said no. She gave me a pixie cut, which I loved. Jokingly called, “My other son.” I loved it.

~~

I was 14. Meant as an insult, “When you wear a skirt, you walk like a man in a kilt.” I loved it.

~~

Alanna the Lioness. I wanted to be her. I wanted to live as a man and learn to fight and be underestimated because of my sex and then defeat them.

~~

I was an alto.

~~

Just kidding, there’s more to it than that, haha. I was an alto 2. I wanted to be an alto 3. Powerful in depth of voice.

~~

When my hair started to grow out, I wanted to dress like a Beatle. I found a pair of Beatle boots and still whenever I find Beatle boots, I buy them.

~~

When I was 14, I found a pair of boy’s dress shoes that fit me at a thrift store. I bought them. I actually had a moment where I thought, “What if this is my style? What if I just wear boy’s clothes?” And then I remembered that I was a girl and it would be weird.

~~

I founded a theatre company based on nontraditional casting so that I could be John Adams in 1776. And Harold Hill. And Elyot Chase. So I could ask to play men’s roles and it would be in the name of art. Good cover.

~~

Sophomore in college. Our sardonic History of Musical Theatre teacher was absent for a class and so made us watch Desperate Living while he was gone because he “wanted to show us that John Waters isn’t just Hairspray.” The butch character who asked to have a penis and then showed their partner and their partner was horrified even though it was something that that character really really wanted and so they cut off their penis. Could. Not. Stop. Thinking. About. Them. I thought, wouldn’t it be great if you could put on a penis every once and awhile? And then take it off?

~~

When I first saw Hedwig. Oh my god, when I first saw Hedwig. Yes. Yes. The pain down in your soul was the same as the one down in mine. To feel like a fraud in pants and a fraud in a skirt and wondering why you can’t be both. The tragic humor of it.

~~
When I look at myself in the mirror after putting on make-up (not for stage):

 

~~

Kindergarten. My male friend Jesse was Skulltor. My female friend Vicky was Wonder Woman. I was “a bunny rabbit who could fly.” Genderless.

~~

I loved Care Bears. I wanted to be Tenderheart, Bright Heart Raccoon, or Nobleheart. Three androgynous/masculine/undetermined characters.

~~

I remember being told that my favorite color was magenta.

~~

I’m not disgusted by my female body. I just don’t really know what to do with her.

~~

I am uncomfortable with my assigned gender role.

 

~~

I’m five. I’m in ballet class. Teacher asks us all what we want to be. Lots of princesses, fairies, lambs, fairy princess lambs. I want to be Peter Pan. Why? I say Cathy Rigby play him on Broadway and the concept of a woman being a boy fascinated me. I had Peter Pan dreams for years.

~~

Back to Care Bears. I sorta had a thing for Dark Heart. Maybe I just have a thing for red headed cartoon boys?

~~

I, uh, sorta want to be Gaston.

~~

I think I loved Prince Philip because I wanted to be him. No carrots.

~~

“Grace Kelly” by MIKA comes out. I need to meet him. I do at a Virgin Records store in Hollywood and he signs my album. This song speaks to me almost as much as Hedwig speaks to me.

~~

Sephiroth and Griffith and Seshomaru and Beetlejuice (the cartoon) and Peter Pan (people I wanted to be/sorta attracted to)

~~~

I realize I’ve always had body dysmorphia, but didn’t know what it was called. And it’s not that I see my breasts and am upset by them, but I have always seen myself as a brawnier person. A larger person with burlier shoulders. I always feel that I physically take up more space than I do. I think I can’t fit in between a chair and a table when I can. I’m surprised when I see how much smaller my shoulders are. It dawned on me today that that is body dysmorphia. I always thought it was because I thought I was fat.

In Between

I am a native New Yorker from the West Coast.

I am patrilineally Jewish.

I am both a man and a woman and neither.

I am a Millennial born before cell phones.

I am a skinny plus size.

 

 

I Have a Blog No One Reads, Too — And I Know How to Use It

So. . . it’s been awhile. Turns out when you give birth to twins, your ability to sit still for lengthy periods of time seriously dwindles. I did pull off the all-female production of 1776, which was nominated for five local BroadwayWorld Awards and won for Best Costumes (YESSSS!). I was nominated as Best Actress in a Musical and as Person to Watch, which was very flattering and exciting, even if I didn’t win. I also performed in two other productions (Into the Woods and a world premiere play called My Dear Miss Chancellor, which was about a secret society of sword fighting lesbians set in Jane Austen era London and yes it was as bad ass as that sounds).

I’ve been busy. Happy. Exhausted. Busy. And not very full of writing, I am sorry to say!

So what, dear reader, has brought me out of hibernation?

Why, self-righteous rage, of course!