Don't Eat The Yellow Snow

more old kudzu from a few years ago that i'm rethinking/reconfiguring. enjoy.

Just when I thought we were in the clear, I woke up to a near blizzard a few days ago. It was the worst storm the city had ever seen since white folks started keeping records of such things. I stared out my kitchen window, transfixed. Even though I was watching it happen, it was still hard to believe. Fluffy stuff was billowing through the air in millions of tiny delicate specks that eventually landed gently somewhere below me, with no end in sight. The day before, it was a filthy cityscape. Now everything was covered with sugar. It was ethereal. The white sheen of the snow against the pale sky made it all gleam and resonate with a purity that was supposed to be everything that the city was not. And yet, somehow whenever it snowed hard enough to bury everything in a blinding whiteness, I felt that I had discovered the essence of this place.

I had to go outside to be a part of it.

Of course, it's always a bad idea to go outside and play in the snow when you're unemployed because you could catch a horrible cold or the flu or something that's just as insidious. I have health coverage, though, so I didn't care. Still, being sick can be pricey. I decided to walk up the block to Broadway to see what was going on and then come straight back to my place. It was only a block but it was a long walk because no one had shoveled the sidewalks. I had to struggle past snowdrifts that were once parked cars and bags of garbage. When I got there I couldn't believe what I saw: nothing. I mean, nothing. There was no action anywhere. No traffic. No crackheads wandering around, like lost children. Not one bodega doing business. Even the mailman didn't make his rounds--and according to his company's little slogan, that's not an option. It wasn’t even that cold.

You know what made it really bizarre? It was deathly quiet.

I stood out there for awhile, all by myself, taking it all in. I knew it wouldn't last. In a few days, there would be an unholy stench from the curb because of the garbage. The fluffiness in the street that resembled huge mounds of marshmallow crème would turn into brown slush because of the cars and the exhaust and the foot traffic. There would be patches of yellow snow everywhere. And then everything would look filthier than it did before the blizzard. But for the moment everything is pure and clean and bright and real. For the moment I imagine that this is what it feels like to be trapped inside an Elsworth Kelly. For the moment all the flowing bits slow down around me, like a Peckinpaw killing spree. For the moment, I'm not in New York City. I’m not anywhere at all.

My Right Guard Rite of Passage

This is a little something that resurfaced from my old "Kudzu" blog, and that I'm rethinking for later publication. Enjoy!

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When I was little, I knew that I wanted to be just like the men in my life: strong, independent, fearless. It was as though I was surrounded by the kind of potentates who knew to expect certain things from the world because of their gender. I didn't know exactly what those things were, but I expected them, too. I watched my brothers mature, carrying the aura of this masculine influence like an invisible cloak, and I awaited my turn eagerly in spite of the way that I was treated: they wouldn't take me hunting or fishing; I wasn't included on car repair forums or home improvement expeditions to buy things like dry wall; I wasn't allowed to fistfight in the backyard like they did. I had baby-faced cousins in their late teens so I knew that it would be years before I would be able to shave. Deodorant, it seemed, would have to be the great equalizer. Secretly, Right Guard would be my rite of passage.

I was too young to know what Right Guard was used for, but evidently it was an important manly tool like lots of other things that I saw in the bathroom: Magic Shaving Cream, the powder that my father mixed with water like an alchemist; Dax hair pomade, so different from the Sulfur 8 on the female side of the cabinet; and of course Hai Karate. (What single swinging guy in the 70's could leave the house without putting on some of that stuff?) To me, Right Guard was different. It was something that real men used religiously because it was the only thing that could quell the kind of bodily stench that emanates from the arrogance and surety of sheer masculinity.

The enormous bronze aluminum can with its authoritative black lettering proved itself to be a feast for my kiddy senses. It always felt like a cylindrical brick in my arms when I'd attempt to examine it. You'd have to be a real man just to pick this up, I must've thought. Audibly, it was constantly doing things to let you know that it was there. It sounded like a gigantic can of Redi-Whip whenever anyone used it, hissing its way onto each hairy armpit like some newfangled call of the wild. The smell was overwhelmingly musky - a cologne, aftershave and deodorant in one - and it lingered in the air like smog, creating a white puff when it was emitted, leaving a chalky residue on skin and clothes. A little gift and a happy reminder to let you know that Right Guard was on guard, and in control.

And then there were the other noises it would make, from the loud pop that happened when the oversized cap was removed to the thunk of its weight as it was placed on the bathroom counter. Solid. Durable. Practical. Even the name inferred a special brand of reliability and strength reserved for the strong willed iconoclast that was prepared to machete their way through the wilderness of life, whether it was a day of fly fishing or a corporate take-over. A world away from the flowery-scented pastel-labeled and curiously silent roll-on my mother used. The marketing pundits didn't have to tell me twice. I could walk into our bathroom, observe this ritualistic display of personal hygiene and know that I was a real man.

Then puberty struck.

Somewhere in the flow of blood, somewhere on my flat chest, somewhere in my inability to be what everyone seemed to think of feminine or even pretty, somewhere in my refusal to define my self-worth solely by my looks, somewhere in the lack of attraction the opposite sex had for me, somewhere in the midst of all of that I knew that although I was turning into a woman, on the inside I would always be a man. I would be smart and strong and independent, and I would never apologize for it.

I don't use Right Guard, by the way. It's an icon of my 70's childhood, like the navy blue maxi-coat I outgrew when I was eight. But that big brass can is a powerful symbol for me of all those who, without realizing it, taught me how to be a man on my own terms when I was a little girl.