Pumpkin.
The story of a sorority girl who falls shamefully in love with a mentally retarded boy.

Christina Ricci barely passes as a plausible sorority girl, which makes the story line almost convincing. In the end, the pain she experiences has graced her with depth and the respect of all her peers. The underlying message that the director conveys must be: mentally handicapped persons are emotionally compatible with sorority girls if given a little chance to win them over. This, I believe like the world is round.

I tell Peter about the time when I was set up with a retarded guy, by my very own lion-hearted mother, who has a notorious affection for underdogs. As a highschool girl that hung out with the 'dark siders' and punk rockers, I was horrified of course. But being the obedient repectful child I was, I needed a crafty excuse for to be discharged from the whole socially scarring experience. In the end, I think I convinced her that with the age difference it could be ultimatly categorized as statutory rape and sternly frowned upon by the rigid and heartless folks at Child Protective Services. Alas, I heard nothing more of it.

I still don't know what my mother told her best friend, Roz who wanted her son to experience a full life including dating...because knowing that the issue was in wash was all I needed for resolution and inner peace. Time, meds, and therapy heal all wounds, but the attraction and allure of dating retards lasted well into my twenties.

As mother reads this, she mumbles...'...put it in the book titled 'Mommy Dearest'.

Piece of Cake
I am twenty-nine by 3 days, and today I tasted komqwats for the first time...so new to me I can't hardly spell it. The orange's little bundle of joy, I loved her before I even knew her christian name. Sweet on the outside and sour on the inside was how they were first presented to me, and I drank one in while taking a lesson on how to cherry pick the tiny darlings. Even the name sounds to me like a flourished sommersault.
The bakery is magnificent, all of us loving it as our own-- and rushing past eachother in an italian cream whirlwind, our egos jabbing eachother in the kidneys in competition for utter perfection. Each of us carries a specialty: the one that binds the cakes, the one that frosts them, the ones that decorate, the ones that dress the tops, the one that manages, and the one that handles the bridezillas.

Mine is managing the Lakewood customers,
who very often times have very definitive ideas on how a cake should be,
and a good deal of fiscal flexibility.
It is not altogether uncommon for a mother to order a 2 tier two hundred dollar cake for a first birthday. It is not altogether uncommon for her to call 4 times following; twice to make changes, and twice to 'check and make sure' we've 'got it'.

We all take turns with customers at the bakery, but somehow, the better you are at your craft, the worse you are dealing with the public. That whole tortured artist mentality is a bitch I suppose, but I wouldn't know since I'm the grunt of the opperation. So, when the crazies walk in, they are asked to pause for a moment while I am prepped with on the anomolie and brought out from behind a baker's rack to soothe an order from beyond their little 'quirks'.

And so Margaret the wedding consultant, well into her 50's and a Sex Pistols fan asks of me, 'What is the most difficult customer situation you've had so far?'

A skinny sun bed and peroxide decayed lady with a nervous disorder who added 75 bucks worth of additions onto her 45 dollar cake in green orange and teal who insisted 'I'd better not see one glimmer of white on that cake.' Upon pick up she stuttered for half and hour uncertain about what 2nd cake she'd choose for the event, devising and revising plans on whether to bake an additional cake and smash the two together. I advised that she buy the 2nd cake and go home and take a good long rest. Eventually, she couldn't get a credit card to pass half and hour after we'd already closed down shop.

But then there are the endearing ones. Like Robin, the woman who faithfully orders her 18 chocolate chunk cookies in a pleading voice always one day after cut off every 10 days. Once she was bedridden and paid by phone so that when her husband came by for pick up he wouldn't be alarmed by the 2 bucks a gram price tag. Her situation so specific and desperate, sometimes devoring more than she can recall in one setting and then accusing us of swindling her...but always back again for more.

For all the Robins out there. My snowflake, I salute.

Jerome is missing. The for lease sign already up in front of the house. His black Volvo station wagon no more.
___________________________
We had met eachother for many mornings on my way to walking Sailor to 'The Cave' for coffee.
Always he stands above me and atop the little mound where his house sits. Always at least twelve feet away, and always in dark glasses that black out his eyes and make him almost invisible to anyone a shade less nosey than I.

'Uh, hi.'
'Hi.'
'Uh... [just come out with it, no need beating around the...uh, bush?]
I have to ask...I mean my boyfriend says, that you are a porn star.'

His cheeks burst with white teeth.

'I could never ask someone that' he says in a pillowy Michael Jackson-like voice.
I appologize sincerely to the tar inbetween the sidewalk slabs.

'It's okay' he'd says to me, and then 'why do you ask me that...?' hesitant to answer.
'It's just that this woman at Whole Foods I guess had said....'

'Whole Foods?' he was very confused because he doesn't understand it to be the bastion of neiborhood gossip that it is'...but why do you want to know?'
'I don't know, I just want to know, I mean I've never actually even watched porn before.'
'Oh no? Well, I've got some of the DVDs upstairs if you'd like, I could go..'
'No no....NO! I just wondered.'
Quiet and teeth again.

'Actually, I'm 40 years old now, and I don't do that anymore. I produce now.'
Oh. Okay.

Turns out, he wants to sell all of his things and move to Brazil. Drop the dog at the pound, sell his antiques and go in August. Might teach engligh even. Do I have any books he can borrow?

But the clincher.
We chat for days,
until one morning he pops the question.
Would I like to go?
'To...to Brazil? With you to Brazil?'
'Yes.'
'Uh, yes and no...but I think the No is going to win out.'
Why?

And so the opportunity to run away with a porn star to Brazil comes and passes too quickly...like sands through an hourglass as they say.

And back to cake.