Head Job
“Are you going to update your website when you get back home? I don’t think it’s such a good idea to leave it dormant for the whole summer.”
“I’m not sure. I’m only there for a couple of days and I just don’t have the desire to write anything at the moment.”
“What’s blocking you from writing about what’s going on? You should feel proud of yourself.”
“Oh, I do, but it’s still in the early stages. My life is nice right now and no one wants to read about nice. I’m feeling healthy and enjoying myself day to day. Who’s interested in that? People want conflict, they want a voyeuristic experience.”
“So give it to them.”
“There’s no conflict in my life right now. Nothing I am doing, at this stage of the game, has any bite to it – not like the stuff I wrote before, when my life resembled a soap opera. Now that that whole mess is behind me, I just don’t feel angry. I’ve lost that “pissed off” edge.”
“Want me to piss you off?”
“No! You haven’t see me angry and I’d like to keep it that way.”
“I’ve read your website. I think I’d like you angry. There must be something that pisses you off about your life right now.”
“I’m pissed off at being fifty, okay? And I don’t know who to complain to about it. I’m pissed off at AARP for informing me that I can now save two hundred bucks a year on my auto insurance.”
“So write about that. Write about being fifty. You are, after all, now officially Norma Desmond’s age.”
“There is something tragically humorous about that.”
“For instance?”
“Well, I was in line at the post office last week and there was a guy, probably in his late twenties, in front of me. He turned his head to the side and caught sight of my legs.”
“You must have been wearing those jeans.”
“As a matter of fact, I was. He worked his way up my body with his eyes. He was enjoying himself and I was enjoying him enjoying me. When he got to my face he was startled, you know like he’d just realized his mom’s head was on the body he had been checking out.”
“Maybe he was just surprised you were looking at him?”
“Thanks, but no, this guy looked embarrassed at being caught ogling an old broad. I felt bad for him.”
“That is kind of funny.”
“Yeah…… pretty damned funny.”
