Being a person who loves clothes and costumes as much as say crack addicts love crack, I can say that I hate mimes, particularly the violent Parisian variety with their disturbing outfits and evil ways. They rival clowns for sheer horror level. Who, I ask you, studies to be a mime? In my life, I'm fortunate not to see many of these types walking about, miming about time and mocking me. The closest I ever get is witnessing a fashion disaster or two, an unfortunate use of stripes (I like them okay, but I urge you, dear readers, to wear them sparingly now that they are back in style and never with a nautical theme less one invoke Shirley Temple's masterpiece "On the Good Ship Lolipop"), especially as visible long socks (God help us all) and people miming things in a cross between stage whisper and sign language when someone is in the room who isn't supposed to hear.I have been mocked in a mime-like fashion recently at DFW Airport (a nightmare- sized place bigger than the entire island of Manhattan) by an extremely skinny deaf/mute girl with bright red braids framing both sides of her face. She made her companions laugh by imitating my movements, sticking her extremely flat ass out to imitate my, umm, not so flat one, throwing her braids back, and easing into her seat the way I do. My sister noticed it first, then I did and had to laugh. That little bitch had me down! What could I do? I pouted in my seat, wearing my new Hello Kitty t-shirt, and she imitated that too! She signed something to her friends, and I caught her eye. I gave her a death glare to end all death glares. She looked at me as if she'd just woken up and did not return my stare. That was the end of the show. Alas, there are some looks that scare even would-be mimes. She'd never make it in Paris.
Michelle's Spell of the Day
"You can be up to your boobies in white satin, with gardenias in your hair and no sugar cane for miles, but you can still be working on a plantation. " Billie Holiday
Music for drinking: The Complete Billie Holiday box set (Verve Edition -- it's the most depressing)
Benedictions and Maledictions
Kiss
So once again hope is marred.
You are not what you thought
you would be. I saw a man
take a cookie off a rattlesnake’s
head without harm. When he
dared to kiss it, the snake kissed
back. Risk is an emergency room
full of people with their hearts
in their hands, thinking they might
have been luckier this time.
17 comments:
There's a really good shoe shining sequence in the movie "Paris, Texas," but no mimes that I recall. Nice photo, Michelle. Reminds me of that song--"The House of the Rising Sun." Cheers. Veuve Cliquot to all my friends!! Have a great Fall semester, but no drinking Spells in class, please.
Wow! My two biggest fears in two consecutive posts. Mimes and tarantulas. I'm a 6'2", 300lb man who likes to think he can take care of himself, but if you threw a tarantula on me (or a mime for that matter), I think I would go ahead an have a massive coronary. I wouldn't even bother trying to brush either of them off.
I'm a cham-peen lurker, but I had to de-lurk after reading these two posts.
My oldest daughter not only hates mimes, but has a world-class fear of clowns to boot.
Look before you lurk.
I like mimes. Silence is golden. Actions speak louder than words. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. The rest is silence.
The Verve Billie Holiday Box Set. You're definatly speaking my language there. I've bought that set in 1995 (the 10 disc collection right?)
Good poem. Love your perseption of risk. Mimes are pretty lame. If one ever starts imitating me I think I'm going to try kicking my own ass like Ed Norton in Fight Club. We'll see if who'll be the last one standing.
Cajun Queen, i wanted to go to the house of rising sun all my life until i found out it wasnt really in New Orleans. that made me sad but you make me happy to be still living any way Foxy One TR2 C2!
Dear Michelle,
Your post gave me a good laugh, for I too am no friend to mimes (or clowns or snakes for that matter) Bravo to your lovely poem and portrait as always.
I love it when you dress like a slut, Michelle. So God help me. Joseph Heller was attracted to sluts. Now I don't feel so bad. Jesus was attracted to Mary Magdalene. Now I really don't feel so bad.
Mary Magdalene was not a slut; she was his wife. She was portrayed that way by the "Church" because that's the only way those men like their women--either virgins or sluts.
Thanks Miss R -- I think you make an excellent point. I've always been a huge Mary fan, both of them, and I think that whenever a woman is remotely sexual, she gets coded by the ruling patriarchy as a threat to order. HA! Women tend to shut down for fear of judgment which is the true tragedy. Thanks again for defense!
Madonna is "coded by the ruling patriarchy as a threat to order"? Puhleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeez!
Robin, you are an angel and it's so sweet of you to be protective of Michelle, but there's no evidence in the NT that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene. I'm pretty sure she was in danger of being stoned to death as an adultress, thus my implication that she was a "slut." P.S. Love your blog, Robin, and, of course, am enslaved by Michelle's.
AP, Do you believe everything you read, that the Bible is the "inerrant" Word of God? If so, no theological debate from me. I don't try to change people's minds through being right or wrong. I just like to question reality and ask others to do the same. Wouldn't common sense tell us that the words written by a bunch of men who weren't even at the scene of the crime, many, many years after the fact could've possibly contained a mistake or two, especially men seeing the potential of power involved in such a burgeoning religion? Even eyewitnesses to a crime tell different stories. So, what is really going on, underneath it all? Reason may get a bad name from religionists, but blind faith is just too huge of a pill for me to swallow. Been there, done that, and the taste of vomit was more than I could bear. Thanks for the compliment on my blog, though; I do appreciate your kind words. Cheers, Robin
Dear lovely Robin(and maybe a little Michelle in there), I was focusing on a single tree and your rebuttal dwelt on the whole Amazon Rain Forest. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea culpa? I don't zink zo. Did you notice that Michelle is signed up for all those argumentation classes this semester? I look forward to seeing her op-ed piece on Michigan's affirmative action crisis--Detroit Free Press op-ed page, of course, or maybe even in the NYT, our nation's paper of record.
AP, I admit it, I did go overboard with my earlier comment. I do see the forest more than the trees. And you pushed two of my buttons--calling women sluts and organized religion, all in the same comment! Being a member of a born-again Christian family was not good; I got a heavy dose of hypocrisy. So, I appreciate your comment; looks like I still have some judgment of my own to forgive! --The Not-So-Lovely Robin
Lovely Robin, AP is not a slut caller. Look closely at his original "slut" post and you'll see he called no one a slut. Twelve years of Roman Catholic education knocked all the slut calling out of him.
It's sweet of you, AP2, to be so protective of AP; you must be a man, as well.
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