SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY-

My childhood was a combination of magic and terror.

I come from a loud, sprawling clan of first generation Italian Americans who, for the most part, resided within walking distance of each other in the hamlet of Pelham, New York, a suburb of Manhattan.

They loved food, God, their newly adopted country, baseball and their family with fervent yet equal abandon. My earliest memories are of the wrap around porch of my grandparents’ home overflowing with cousins and aunts and uncles eating, drinking and talking all at once, of my older cousins wearing teased bouffant hair styles, and white lipstick, their hemlines inching way above the knee, of my grandfather and his brothers drinking homemade wine and smoking hand rolled cigars beneath the grape arbors in the backyard, of going into Manhattan, my hand held firmly in my grandfather’s, to watch the circus elephants arrive in town linked trunk to tail, of Jones Beach, of Coney Island, of rambling village parades where nearly half of those marching were related to me. Of holidays: of Christmas, Thanksgiving and Easter, Halloween and the Fourth of July where the house was always full of people who had known me since I was born.

(more…)

ANNAPOLIS, MD -

I learned to curse from the kids down the road. I don’t know where they learned it. Maybe they snuck into the living room late one night and watched Cinemax. Or maybe someone let them listen to that George Carlin bit (Carlin, of course, has become my cursing idol - what an appreciation for language that man has). They knew all the basics and a few interesting combinations. I didn’t know what “fuck” meant but understood it to be foul and taboo, so the combination “buttfuckers” struck me as joyously obscene. We were the kind of kids who integrated new words into our vocabulary by shouting them while jumping on the trampoline, leaping off the bed or bounding from one piece of furniture to another trying not to touch the floor — lava, obviously. If you had first encountered cursing in such a magnificent, joyful, wild atmosphere, you would love it, too. Few things entertain me more than the thought of my eight-year-old self in mid-air shouting “buttfuckers” with glee. (more…)

LAS VEGAS, NV-

My cousin and I are sitting on a kitchen windowsill, smoking. We’re seven.

Outside, Moscow is blooming. Inside, we’re extras in a WWII-themed flick called Sisters, or Girlfriends. I can’t remember for sure. In this scene two women argue about so many damn Gypsies running around town. It’s intense. My cousin and I are supposed be acting like we’re talking, smoking, laughing. We’re so excited we can barely do that.

One of the two women is a famous Soviet actress. She’s crying. We can’t help admiring her skills, but we’re actors, too. So, we talk and smile, and we make sure to smoke as much as possible during the scene, because our parents would break our fingers if we tried it for real. In the name of art, we light one cigarette after another.

(more…)

NEAR 91 DEGREES LONGITUDE-

I don’t remember giving consent. Or protesting. Or having a choice, not with adult forces at work. A secret committee decided that I should represent my elementary school at the Little Miss Lafayette pageant. How I got the news, I’m not sure, but my guess is this:

My mother: “Ronlyn, you’re going to be in a beauty pageant. You were picked out of everyone from the whole school. Isn’t that wonderful?”

Me: I likely scowled. I likely pondered the real threat of dress-up clothes. It’s possible I asked, “Why me?”

(more…)

SAN FRANCISCO, CA-

I am about eight years old in this photo. The little boy I am towering over is about four. His name is Louis. The 1950’s love-bot next to poor, distraught, little Louis is, indeed, yours truly. For the record Louis did not want to be wearing that frilly dress and bonnet, but I can be very persuasive. Even as a child I had a thing for men in drag.

When I look at this picture I feel profound joy. I smile at those skinny legs, laugh at that proud expression, and am filled with a sense of pride and love for my silly little self. I want to hug me.

There was no adult help in the conception and preparation of this get-up. It was my own creation, my own vision, a vision of a sullen housewife, perhaps, or maybe a haughty hooker. I’m not sure. I have no idea what I was thinking, but I know I loved it. I loved that blond curly wig, those red prostitute heels, that green synthetic monstrosity, those strap-on, plastic, Dolly Parton tits with their enormous pronounced, engorged nipples. I remember the hilarity that ensued whenever I donned that outfit and slunk into a room of adults. I didn’t understand why it was funny, but I loved the reaction.

(more…)

VANCOUVER, BC-

My eldest sister, Sara, was sixteen years old the night she ran away from home. My two older brothers and other older sister and I were in the den, sitting on the multi-colored shag carpet, watching “The Brady Bunch,” when Sara walked past us, clutching a bundle of laundry. No one paid her much attention; but as she walked through the room I looked up and she looked down and in that moment, that fractured, timeless glance, I saw her eyes, a searing, searching look inside her eyes. I have to go before I die; I can’t look back or else I’ll cry. Then she was gone, around the corner and down the stairs and, as I learned later that night, out of the house and our lives like an unwelcomed guest taking flight. (more…)

SMALLTOWN, TX-

If Mom were a superhero, she would be The Piddler.

When she needs to wash her hands, she’ll look through coupons first. If she needs to pick up the dry cleaning, she’ll stop at the antique store on the way. And when she needs to go to work, she’ll watch a rerun of Ab Fab, then show up half an hour late claiming, “Traffic was just awful today,” which, turns out, is every day.

I’d like to say that old age is responsible for this poking trait, but Mom’s always been a world class stoner without the weed.

(more…)

LAS VEGAS, NV-

We board the train to Kazakhstan in the middle of the night; thirty of us stuffed canned-food-style into the last three cars. Once the ticket agent at the Moscow central station found out she was dealing with performers and Gypsies, all the good tickets mysteriously sold out. We were stuck riding the back where everything swerved and rattled and swayed from side to side, like a shark’s tail.

(more…)

MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA-

I was told it was Spanish.  I was told it was terrifying. All I needed to hear was that there were zombies involved and I was going to sign up come hell or high water. One brain-eating confirmation later and I was on my friend’s couch with two amigos, watching [REC], cheering every time one of the undead got taken out and trying to utilise my recent Spanish lessons to understand what was going on without the aid of subtitles (luckily for me, screaming is the same in any language). (more…)

VANCOUVER, BC-

My mother has taken to writing letters, in German, to her granddaughter, my sister’s oldest daughter. My niece is 14 years old, and has been studying German, my mother’s native tongue, for three years. When I asked my mother what she writes in her letters—not that it’s any of my business—she said, “I tell her about my experiences in the concentration camp. I think she’s old enough to learn what her grandmother survived.”

(more…)

PORTLAND, ME -

My brother always says that if he had a choice, he would have stopped aging right around the time he turned two.

Life was simple back then: Play dates. Naps. Mushy comfort foods. Lots of crawling around on the floor. Do something simple like utter a sentence and the adults around you clap and call you cute names. How much better can it get?

I, on the other hand, always wanted to be a grown up. I wouldn’t leave my mom’s side at the playground, because I just had to listen to what the adults were talking about. Going to sleep was out of the question while my parents were still awake, because I couldn’t possibly miss all the exciting stuff that was going on between my bedtime and theirs.

I thought that adults had it all. They could choose what clothes to wear in the morning and what to eat for breakfast. They could go to work and drink coffee and smoke – all at the same time! – and nobody would tell an adult to “put your gloves on!” or “no dessert until you finish your homework!” Also, as an adult, you could have a boyfriend and get married and have sex and babies – and not necessarily in that order. You didn’t have to account for where your allowance went and, darn it, if you wanted to spend it on pink notebooks, you could and nobody would say a thing about it.

(more…)

PARIS, FRANCE -

I.

With gleaming-white buckteeth, unharnessed by braces, Greg Downes had it rough.  His wide brown eyes revealed every injustice he’d ever endured.  Every time he’d been tricked, teased or made to eat grass, it was all there in his big wounded antelope eyes.

When Greg was angry, which was often, he’d sit on the curb in front of his house with his feet in the gutter and his shoulders hunched high about his ears.  He thought it made him look like a high school football player and he told us so.

“I’m a football player,” he’d say.  “So, fuck you.”

We teased him until he cracked.  Which was the goal.  We wanted the spectacle.  When he’d snap he’d lose his mind and hold up both hands and give us all the double-finger: two long middle digits pointing to the sky, respective servants, pointer and index, kneeling prostrate at their sides.

(more…)