Barbara Jane’s Coffee Klatch, September 21, 2014
Robin Goldwasser
Coffee’s ready! Of course we can talk about it...let’s talk about it. You mean the car? Honestly, I assumed he’d see that one and maybe have a little chuckle and sponge it off and that would be that. Don’t be insane; of course I’m not sorry! Well, no, I didn’t really expect anyone else to see it, but. Well, you know. I’d written it so many times at this point the meaning had completely faded and it was just something I did. Exactly, yes, a hobby! No, I didn’t really expect anyone else to--wait, let me top you off, there. Half-caff. No, just half. I mix them together so I don’t get too jangly. Oh, I am all about maintaining a steady buzz. So, yeah, no, I wasn’t thinking anyone else would necessarily see it, but again, I wasn’t really thinking about it all that hard. Kind of become inured to it, exactly. No, Kahlua, honey. Yeah, no, in the coffee. Well, that’s what makes it a half-caff. Half coffee, half booze. I know. Delish. Wait, wait! Try one of these. Just try one. Just try one, I’m telling you, you’ll die. You’ll die. See? Are you dying? Was I wrong? Date paste instead of butter. I KNOW! Because you wouldn’t’ve put it in your mouth if I told you is why. Yummy yummy? So, I’d written it so many times on so many private or at least quasi-private things that either only he’d see, or at worst, he and his whore would see it together. Oh, everything. Like the waistbands of his underwear. Every single pair of his underwear. No, like inside the elastic waistband. Y-fronts. Sharpie. Thank you! Right? So simple, I know. So he’d have to see it every time he got dressed or went to the bathroom or, you know, fucked his whore. A little more coffee? Well there wasn’t anything dangerous or abusive or what’s he calling it? Mental and emotional abuse? Man screws around on his wife and wife must stay silent? That’s your emotional abuse right there, folks. Uh uh. Sorry. He can’t flip it around and play the victim here, no way, Jose. Annie Flor Is My Whore just became my, like you said, my hobby. My creative way of reminding him he is a cad and a heel and a shit-nick and a whorefucker. But that was between him and me. And her. Annie Flor, his whore. Hey! I did not make this world. I did not make her name rhyme with what she is. Yes I labeled all his Y-fronts. And then his work shirts. Just down the shirt front placket where it meets the button placket. Sorry, Home Ec jargon. This part, here...see? Like, behind where your buttons--exactly! I know! Doesn’t show to the outside world; nobody’s the wiser! Our little secret. Literally, our inside joke. But he has to be somewhat careful. Tuck in the point of his tie and don’t make any sudden moves or else! Yes, to put him on his guard, exactly. Make him ever vigilant, anxious. I did his ties, too. Straight down the back lining.
Well, I started writing it on the inside covers of his school agendas. That’s when I got the stamp made. I’m friends with, you know Hank? Print department Hank? Hank. Oh, Hank’s a saint. Didn’t bat an eyelash; didn’t say a word. Just made the stamps. Self-inking, with water-soluble ink. So then I was in business. It was ANNIE FLOR IS MY WHORE inside every cover of all his school materials, for his eyes only. One sec: Christ, Eileen! Turn your music down, please! Down! Thank you.
So, the stamp. The stamp was addictive. I just wanted to stamp everything. Stamp! Stamp! Stamp! Stamp! It FELT so GOOD to STAMP his SHIT! He collects first editions. I don’t know, his guy authors. So it had to go on his first editions. I know. Well...yeah, but still, fuck him. Oh, Jim Harrison or whoever the hell he worships. As an educator, believe me, it pained me to desecrate books, especially first editions. I have the utmost respect for books. But. You know. What can I say? I was compelled. Well, just in case he ever cared to investigate cleaning methods, not that he would, but theoretically he could just take a damp sponge, you know, just scant amount of water on a sponge, ever so slightly moistened, or, sheesh, ever hear of ink remover? Put some ink remover on a sponge and leech the ink from the page...Cassandra, don’t you dare tell him that! I’m not kidding. Let him think it’s all a disaster and everything is permanently destroyed forever and all time.
I lived by the stamp. I’d re-do the address labels on his newspapers and sports magazines. That’s when I started getting blank labels from Supplies. Hank has keys but I have keys, too, Cassandra! Of course! Art Department might get squat, but Home Ec is EVERYWHERE. Believe it. And the labels? Pick up any random object of his and look underneath. Sole of his shoe. Under his chair. Inside desk drawers. Inside his locker, for chrissake. No protein drink container was safe. No toothpaste tube. Nada.
Well, I don’t know if he’s moving in with her at this point or staying with me or staying with my brother Gregory...oh, yeah, they were college roommates. True! Greg introduced us. Anyway. I just decided to be safe and forward all his mail to his whore. So I ask Hank for a little favor. A new stamp: PLEASE FORWARD TO MY WHORE: ANNIE FLOR, and then her address. Well, she’s a sub, she subs the whole district, so of course her address is just sitting in the administrative office files. No! Melissa just pulled it for me. Are you kidding? When her husband fucked half the language lab three years ago? Uh huh. Half-caffs by the Thermos-full I was bringing her, like, hourly. Oh, yes, ma’am. So, you know, these little acts of kindness. It’s what makes a community--Cass, let me top that off for you. WHOA! Head rush. Stood up too fast! It’s the barometric pressure combined with maybe I’m a little dehydrated. It’s, well...I have, you’re gonna die: vertigo. Believe it or--I KNOW! Stuff of fiction, I am telling you.
I admit I lost perspective after I’d written ANNIE FLOR IS MY WHORE for the millionth time. Stamping became too mechanical, and I’m sure this is where Caspar would have something to say about the Industrial Revolution, but the physical act of writing...that was just so satisfying. Gosh it felt, I don’t know. Fantastic. It felt fantastic. The self-inking stamp was great, very efficient, but I was missing that physical act of creation. Painting, writing, that’s primal. Communicating with hands. That’s Art. It was Art. Tactile. Touching his things. Being intimate with his possessions. Raising them up. Transforming them beyond their common meaning. A transfiguration took place each time. Art for an audience of one...two at the most. I always made it look intentional, significant. Did the lettering really crisp. Kept it aesthetically pleasing. Like architect’s handwriting if you know what I’m talking about. Oh, they just have really nice handwriting. Anyway. Writing with my finger in the dirt--talk about a primal act--writing that filthy phrase in the filth of the rear window of his Honda Civic was...cocky of me, true. But by then I’d thought we’d established a system of communication. I thought this was our thing. My thing with him. What’s crazy Barbara Jane gonna do next? kind of thing. Caspar’s still technically living at home, mind you. I never kicked him out, which surprises him more than it does me. But I honestly think we are, in our private couple-thing way, working it out. We’re seeing a marriage counselor. The twins are shielded from any of the particulars, to the best of my knowledge. We even still laugh full belly laughs about the rhyming of “whore” and his whore’s name. Because it’s funny! Dark and mean funny, but Caspar laughs, too, so. Plus he is still fucking this person. Out in the open. You know. Moony eyes in the Teacher’s Lounge. Coordinating their coffee breaks for pretend coincidence. God yes, thanks...just a splash. Sharing bag lunches I pack for him. And that is the biggest no-no. That is...pretty bad. So here I am, just living my Art. Can he say the same? Can she? What is her art, anyway? Homewrecking? Home Wreck! Ha! Nah, she’s got nothing. No gifts of any value...which is maybe why she only values...uch. I don’t want to start understanding her all of a sudden.
Just a splash. Here. Go like this when you go home. You go like this: Draw a picture of something that scares you. Boom. That’s always my first assignment for any art class I ever teach, any level, any grade. It’s amaaaaaaazing, that assignment. You should try it with your kids, Cassandra. If you don’t mind the occasional unflattering portrait of yourself gracing your desk. Cassandra should try it with just Cassandra, Cassandra. Cassandra, when you reveal the thing that scares you, Cassandra, you begin to...what’d they say? Address the fear itself. You’re accountable, is the word. For your own fear. Accountable Cassandra. And with that single brave and defiant act of committing to paper what you fear, Cassandra, you conquer that fear! Or you start to. Or you start to, at least. At least, you begin. Maybe this is all just the beginning. Maybe, maybe. I’m going to just rest my head here for one minute. I must think I’m dehydrated. I mean. What’d I say? I meant to say I must think I’m dehydrated.
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Robin Goldwasser is a writer and a musical performer in NYC. Her full-length rock opera "People Are Wrong!" was performed at Mass MOCA, the Bonn Biennale, Central Park's Summerstage, and enjoyed an extended run off-Broadway at the Vineyard Theatre. Her first short play, "The Harbingers of Turpitude," is anthologized in "24 x 24: the 24 Hour Plays Anthology" along with Terrence McNally and Tina Howe. Robin appears in the documentary film "One Night Stand," a grueling romp depicting the 24 hour play process.