Sunday, December 05, 2004

Flash

I like flash.

Do you know what I mean? I like glitz. Glam. Sparkle. Flair.

Two of my favorite movies (and I have a million) are Moulin Rouge and Chicago. I have a weakness for musicals, first of all. It never occurs to me that normal people don’t suddenly burst into song in the middle of their days. Sometimes I have to restrain myself from doing an impromptu tap number with a catchy song in the office for no apparent reason. But I also love the color and style. And the dancing women in lingerie. Because, of course, I dance around my house in lingerie all the time.

My cubicle at the office is a show stopper. People walking past can’t help but raise an eyebrow. I have feather boas hanging on my wall alongside dangling glittery beads and feathered eye masks. I have pink sparkly star garland strung along my bookcase. It’s quite the change from the normal family photos and childish hand drawn pictures made by little children.

EH is always bemused by my “style”, if you can call it that. A kicky 70’s disco song on the radio (like “Last Dance” ) can send me into a burst of gigantic grins and obnoxiously loud singing. A good mood might require me to can-can dance across the living room while EH stares in bafflement from his position on the couch watching a football game.

I also love the tacky. I’m not allowed to decorate our home by myself because I’d make it a circus of eyesores. In my mind, I envision a pink glittery bathroom with rhinestone encrusted everything coupled with gleaming silver mirrors and brushes. I see a whorish red bedroom with walls painted blood red and adorned with animal printed throw pillows, beaded lamps, feathered boas and zebra-printed borders along the ceiling. I once got it in my mind that I wanted a moped motor scooter to putter around our busy little city on. Only I wanted a hot pink one that I could hot glue rhinestones all over.

I collect junk jewelry. If it glitters and sparkles and has a billion colors and dangling beads, I must own it. I’ll wear it happily with a t-shirt and jeans.

I’ve told EH my great “dream” in life is to travel with him…and re-new our wedding vows every place we go in the style of our locale. I see a gaudy Vegas wedding with Elvis escorting me down the aisle in my red sequin harlot’s dress to a sharkskin suit-clad EH. I see a barefoot Hawaiian wedding complete with leis and the sunset. I see a genuine fairy-folk hand fasting ceremony in the middle of a forest by a stream wearing a fairy dress of steamers and ribbons and flowery garlands.

I guess what I’m saying is that it takes a strong man to tolerate me. I’m excitable and dramatic and passionate about everything. I think the world is prettier when you throw glitter on it and the day is more fun if you’re singing and dancing. When something pleases me I shout “Yaaaaaaay!!!” and hop around clapping like a 4 year old.

But I think the “flash” and “razzle dazzle” is my own defense mechanism. As a kid, I never really fit in with the other kids and although I never tried, I never really wanted to. I didn’t feel like I was as good as everyone else and I stuck out like a sore thumb. I had no special talents and was lousy at sports. It wasn’t until my late teens that I discovered how to hide.

Instead of trying to be invisible, I would make myself so unique and unusual that I didn’t have to fit in with any group. I’d deliberately stick out. I’d create my own style, the crazier the better. If I magnified my own eccentricities and flaws and laughed at them first, then people couldn’t point them out because I was already displaying them proudly. If I laughed at myself first, they could never point and laugh at me and make me feel weird. I’d beat them to it all. Remember that old song from “Chicago” called “Razzle Dazzle”? The line “How can they see with sequins in their eyes?” always sticks out to me. So I cover myself in sequins.

Somehow that transformation actually became who I was. Today I take great pride in being eccentric and unusual. When people describe me to others, it’s always using terms like “different” or “unique” and I love it.

But I’m not sure that I am still not hiding just a little bit.

Posted by Red :: 7:29 PM :: | ---------------------------------------