Putting the Madge in Danna (16 page)

God, when I put it like that, it gets me all
tingly! I’m going to do it. I’m going to make the call.

Okay, I’m back. I’ve made an appointment
with Ford Jitsu for Friday morning. Look, my friends, this is all
on the down-low, mum it, because I’m going to have to be sick
(cough, cough). I can’t take any more personal days from Eiffel
Travel because it’s so close to my wedding, you know? I get about
five sick days a year that are paid days off and I’m really never
sick. This is the only appointment I could get. I’m on a tight
schedule as you all know. It’s going to work. It has to. I feel
it.

Comments: 4

You are my ray of
light.
Rob, NY, NY

Open your heart to Zeus.
He’s the only man you need.
Nonni, USA
& UK

I spit on you, three times
and then it go in your eye.
Auntie Sofia,
Toronto, Ont., Canada
It seems to me that you have
everything you need in Zeus. Why do you need something else to
remember?
Kathy Melinos, St. Petersburg,
FL

****

Cock-Ringed Thief of Hearts

Saturday, August 22, 2009 – 9:30pm

Evidently, all artists are not created
equal, but I’m sure you knew that. It’s just that, sometimes I get
an idea in my head of what is supposed to happen, and reality sets
in. Never really in a bad way. Just very…different.

Jean-Michel Basquiat was born in 1960. He
was the son of two normal, middle class parents, but for some
reason, he preferred to live in a box instead of a nice, cozy
house. Yeah, he lived in a fucking cardboard box in Central Park in
New York City, back in the 1980s! I know. I can’t really wrap my
head around that, I guess because my parents and I are so close.
They didn’t even really want me to have an apartment, which, as you
know, I needed for my lovey-dove-dove with my man. Their concern
was my safety so they insisted on paying the rent on the security
building near the school instead of the one I could afford downtown
- because they cared. I know they wished I was still at home. They
have even dropped hints that they’d love for Zeus and me to move in
with them once we’re married.

The first hint was that bathroom remodel.
Mom and Dad had all the bathrooms done. They’d even turned my
grandparents room into a second master, which was a bit odd
considering that they are planning to move to this retirement condo
in Tarpon Springs, Florida right after Christmas.

They’ve also been quite tickled by our house
search, always willing to come with us as we search suburbia for
the perfect home. Mom particularly liked the one with the in-law
apartment above the garage, but it already had an offer on it when
we saw it, and Zeus didn’t like the way our realtor was pushing us
to offer full price.

I love my parents, and I’d live with them in
a heartbeat, but I think they’ll end up living with Dean as soon as
he settles down, since he’s the baby. That’s what all Greek
families do, and I don’t want to be in the way of tradition. And
Dean never challenges Dad like Demetrios does. He likes Greek
cuisine just fine, which makes sense since he works alongside my
parents at the restaurant. He’s dating Stephanie Nichols, a
half-Greek, so there’s hope that everyone will get what they want.
Zeus and I will have our dream alone time before the kids come, and
we’ll all be one big happy family.

I don’t think Basquiat had
a bad relationship with his family. I just think he had wanted to
be an artist more and would have done anything possible to make
that dream come true. There are some people, like my high school
art teacher, Mr. Dundee, who believe that everyone should suffer
for their art. Come on! Really? I mean, he blew my class ranking
with that philosophy when I received a seventy-five percent for my
abstract painting entitled
Cheering to the
Masses
. It was a thingy where I took
watered down acrylic paint to my pom-poms and cheered, shaking them
onto the canvas. Zeus thought it was a brilliantly creative
concept. It was actually one of the reasons I got picked to speak
at graduation. A photographer from
USA
Today
had been at school with a reporter
to do a puff piece on graduating seniors and he took my picture. It
kind of went viral.

Mr. Dundee was probably jealous when I sold
the painting to that New York City collector. That’s why I hate
abstract art. I didn’t care about that picture, but someone else
put a value on it. I cared about school, and I care about family,
you know?

Did Jean-Michel Basquiat like the idea of
suffering for his art as well? He started selling his graffiti
inspired paintings to the mega-rich. He met my pop-idol. He became
a famous painter then blew all his money on blow. And then he
progressed to heroin, shooting himself up so that he could live in
some warped harmony – a lie of a life, because it was based on
fleeting love of the abstract. Basquiat fucked Madonna and then he
died.

I don’t really understand why he would up
and off himself when he had the love of the most special person in
the world. It must have had an impact on her life. This worried me
because it kind of put pressure on me in a way. I wanted my artist
fuckster to be special. Not special like Zeus, but memorable, I
guess. The best of all.

Ford Jitsu’s studio is located in a
dilapidated row of buildings the city plans to renovate, as I’d
mentioned, and make into artsy-fartsy land. He just relocated from
Brooklyn, where he lost a battle with his landlord over a
rent-controlled apartment, as per our primary phone conversation.
His place out in Rye is basically skank-a-wuck central on the
outside but really pristine on the inside, which is cool because no
one would think to try to rob him of all his expensive equipment
and valuable art photography, some of which are one-offs because he
does this hand tinting thingy to the black and white negatives.
There are no windows and so it feels very private, and that was a
good thing because I was about to get nake-e-do in there.

He greeted me at the door. Short, balding
and about thirty-five years old, I thought, because he sort of
reminded me of Chad Mavis in a way (he’s thirty-five) – not too old
in a creepy Warren Beatty way, but old enough to give me a
manly-man gift in my hoo-ha. I was sure I’d seen him somewhere
before, and then it hit me. He looked like a Japanese Pillsbury
doughboy, only human, you know?

I kind of liked that because it made me
think of all the yum-yummies I have been avoiding so that I can fit
into that Alexandre gown I’ve had altered a million and three
times. That’s not exactly true. I’ve been okay with apple pita
because of the fruit while staying clear of anything chocolate or
baklava-ian. But once the wedding is over the losing battle of the
bulge will commence, and I will eat any and all Pillsbury treats. I
told you that before, bloggers, right, that I’m prepared to get
fat. I tried to resist the urge to laugh-out-loud at my own
Pillsbury joke, you know, eating Ford Jitsu or rather, sucking his
pricker. Would it taste like cookie dough? Too late. I burst into
my trademark guffaw like a complete idiot.

“
Laughter is indeed one of
the best gifts,” he said, which sounded so random to me, so
spiritual, I guess, that I really lost it.

“
I’m sorry, Mr. Jitsu,” I
managed through my giggles. “I’ve been thinking about sad stuff
lately, you know, artist angst. I must have needed a good laugh.
Don’t know where it came from.”

“
Are you an artist
too?”

I calmed down a little, thinking I really
needed to get it together for Madonna’s sake. “I was once,” I said.
“I’m a travel agent. Eiffel Travel in Schenectady? We have offices
in Buffalo, Rochester, and Dobb’s Ferry. But not for long. I mean,
I won’t be there for long. After the wedding I’m going to be a
Suzi-homemaker.”

“
That’s honorable,” he
said. “You’re lucky to find a man who can support you. Good for
you.” He clapped his hands the way Irv Goldrodblum had when he met
with me about the corsages – that same gleeful expressiveness that
must come from working with brides. On his internet web page, Ford
Jitsu had offered samples of weddings he’d done in the ‘90s, some
of which had traditional Japanese kimono costuming, which reminded
me of Madonna’s
Rain
video.

“
Thanks, I know,” I said.
“I’m very lucky.” It hasn’t exactly sunk in yet, that my life will
be so different after I get married. I clapped my hands too to
mirror him, thinking it was a way to show him I was interested in
more than just a simple retail transaction. That, and I really do
feel lucky.

“
Well, Miss
soon-to-be-Zepkos,” he said as if it was my actual future last name
– Soontobezepkos, which still sounds Greek, doesn’t it? “What kind
of photographs did you have in mind for this photo
shoot?"

I said, “Zeus travels a lot for work. I was
thinking of giving him something to remember. You know, of the
naked variety.” I whispered the naked part even though we were
alone.

“
Yes, that’s my
specialty,” he said. “I’ve done my share of weddings, which paid
the bills ten years ago, and now I’m able to immerse myself in my
true nature. I call it
Tints and Shades of
Desire
. I’ve done quite well with it.
Especially back in the city, although I have no doubt my clients
will follow me where ever I go.”

“
It’s not just Ford Jitsu
Photography?”

“
Yes, well, I was
referring to my recent work. I give my series titles when I have
gallery showings. It helps catalog the work. Why don’t you look
through some of these lookbooks and we can have a better idea of
your interests.”

I perused the photo books resting in an
orderly precision on the coffee table, while Ford Jitsu sat next to
me on the black leather futon. He looked over my shoulder and gave
a little narrative to each photo. He was worse than Auntie Thalia
when she visits with her professionally cultivated scrapbooks. We
had sat transfixed for hours as she had pointed out the minutia of
every picture from every country that she’d travelled to on her
world tour last summer. She grazed over the shots of the
archeological dig site on Thera, which were the ones we’d really
wanted to see, but we all kept mum about it, because we didn’t want
to upset her.

The ones I’d wanted to see didn’t seem to
exist here. Because these art photos, although extremely sexual in
nature, did not give out the sexy-sexy I’d anticipated. I got the
distinct feeling that I was in some sort of gay fantasyland. These
were the tints and shades of desire? I wouldn’t have pegged these
chaps (some of whom wore chaps) as models, which proves my behind
closed doors theory. There were a number of photographs of big,
hairy and chunky men dressed as bikers except for their massively
thick cocks. Those were exposed save for large gold rings
constricting the poor defenseless pulsating members. I’m using the
plural because two enormous black leather portfolios had been
filled with cock-ring-party-time. Where were all the women?

“
Do you see anything you
like?” he said. He moved one of the books closer to his lap and I
thought I saw a tent in his khakis. He must like my perfume, I
thought. I decided to go for it. Like Auntie Thalia night at the
Elinopoulous house, I thought, I could be here an eternity, if I
didn’t act now.

As I flipped open the last book, I said,
“Maybe I should let you decide what I should do, since I can see
that you are not merely a photographer but a true artist. Here,
I’ll just take my clothes off so that you can have a look-see.”

I continued blabbering stuff about the
principles of art that I remembered from Mr. Dundee’s art class
five years ago while I removed my lucky green gauze mini-dress.
Lucky, I guess, because I was wearing it when Zeus proposed. It
matches one of my bikinis, which I’d worn underneath that day
because we were having a picnic by the lake. This time, I didn’t
bother wearing undergarments because, you know, I didn’t know how
sanitary it would be in this run-down building.

I kept thinking - what if
I left them on the futon couch, and they picked up some nasty
snatch disease or something – one that Dr. Quirkenbush couldn’t
repair? It
was
a
nude portrait studio, you know, and I’m very wary about things and
places I don’t know much about. There could be evidence of flying
jizz lurking about, and I didn’t bring that black light Zeus and I
use when we travel, the one that seeks out semen and blood on hotel
bedding, because Zeus took it with him to Japan.

I actually hate going somewhere new all
alone, especially without my protective gear, like that light. Does
that happen to you, bloggers? For some reason it made sense in my
vision of this event, to throw off my dress, get fucked and go home
with no fuss and no muss – an easy in-and-out and I would have been
on my way. But then, once I’d disrobed, I had to put my dress down
– I’d forgotten about that. I tried to maintain an air of
professionalism as my mind raced with all this messy stuff.

I talked about my plan to surprise Zeus with
this picture for our wedding and how it would be fun to capture my
essence, and what not. I talked about a lot of things including my
interest in Madonna while he kept staring at my
buffy-buffington.

“
My, aren’t we lovely?” he
said.

I said, “Thanks. Thank you, Mr. Jitsu. I’ve
been working out. What do you think of my ass?” He was still
sitting on the futon, adjusting himself the way Zeus does on the
soccer field when his cup is crooked. I handed him my dress then
turned and shoved my booty-boot in his face. And then I saw a
photograph in that last opened book on the coffee table that
captured my attention. It was of a very lean girl wearing a
strap-on and it reminded me of my first Madonna hop-in dream. It
was an omen thingy.