Donnarama Does Madonna
May 28, 2008
The first time I met Donnarama, more than ten years ago, she was plucking my roommate Dimitri’s eyebrows in my living room. I marveled at her beauty school skills, but it soon became apparent that Little Miss Vincent was good at just about everything. Those were happy days when life was all about the Spice Girls and Mike’s Hard Lemonade and every night was a drag show or dancing until dawn.
Of course, Donnarama helped make life absolutely fabulous, and we were a festive bunch. Sometimes, though, we would get frustrated or cry as we tried to figure out the chaos of this world and how to get through it.
One day I wrote a love poem for Vince called A Spell Against Sadness. (This appeared later in my book, The Astronaut’s Wife: Poems of Eros and Thanatos. You can pick it up online at indigo or amazon.) Here it is:
Poem for Vince (a spell against sadness)
for Donnarama
oh God how I wanted
to be a poet and a rock star and a stripper
and a shrink an artist
a missionary how I wanted
to have something
that the rest of the world
might notice
how I never wanted to care
what anybody thought
of anything
oh baby doll, it’s all about
staying alive
falling apart on your floor last night
with fat April and
Sylvester
turning their
yellow-eyed disdain on us
consenting to a brief purr
us being out of
our minds as usual
I wake up wrapped in my dirty old red coat
all the glamour of last night’s liquor and perfume
is a sticky film on our skins
and I go
oh baby doll I hope you get out of here
I want you to see the sights
I want everything to blow your mind
I want crowds for you
applause
I want everything that you ever needed
to be real
I’ll meet up with you
in New Orleans
for whiskey sours
in a dim jazz bar
where absinthe once drenched the floors
where whores and voodoo queens made
their trades
no one will recognize us in our Gucci shades-
we will get into trouble
raise a few eyebrows and a little hell
don’t you worry baby doll,
I am there
when you least expect it in this fucking world
I will be there
you will look up form your cab on Broadway
and see someone wrapped in pink velveteen
crossing the street and you will smile
you will recall stealing ghetto rags from the Goodwill
you will hear someone’s shrill laugh in a club and
you will laugh and that is
where I am
right there
remember:
once how trashed after the club
all the queens soaked in root beer shooters
drenched in late night madness and beats
you and me ran back to my house
with our little horde of marijuana
I was standing like a preacher
waving my arms
yelling about how Courtney Love fell into
the warm blood of the man she loved
feeling how dead he was how we bawled there
leaking stark and sour tears over laughter
our sad strength for Kurt Cobain who didn’t make it
oh baby doll it’s all about
staying alive
honey honey honey
let me hear you on guitar
I hear you plan alone at night
training your fingers to go where the sound comes from
I hear your crown go wild when you come on stage
dressed in drag your own designs
Salvation Armani
dressed up as your heroes
Barbra Barbie Garbage
I watch the spell you weave and know for sure
know for certain
how you of anyone I love
how you can do absolutely anything you damn well please
how you can do anything you want to
in this fucking world
shine on, you crazy diamond.
****
And here she is, friends, a cult on youtube. Here she is, interviewing stars like Garbage’s Shirley Manson for hot magazines. She is a comic genius, and a cosmic masterpiece.
She’s an absolute superstar, soaring higher and higher with every turn. Don’t miss this brilliant Madge parody directed by the talented Devon Poole. Ladies and gentlemen, it’s Donnarama!
Papa, watch me fly!!!!
after Donna Tartt’s Secret History
May 24, 2008
after Donna Tartt’s Secret History
i see Bunny tumble
down the rabbit hole,
his death unfolds
through the lives of those who
pushed him, lost him,
dark tribe.
it was ten days before they found him
in his snowy tomb at the ravine’s depth
icy, blue, as gothic as the twins
with their pale scars
Bunny,
covered in snowflakes
like feathers.
Lorette C. Luzajic
Too much is made of Madonna’s ‘shifting identities,’ her masks and personas and disguises. For 20 plus years, it seemed as if the only thing Madonna-writers could mention was how she reinvented herself. In fact, that is why Madonna called a recent tour “Re-Invention.” Yes, yes, of course she represents a million manifestations. It’s called ‘show biz’ for a reason.
Lucy O’Brien is no exception with her 23007 Harper Collins book, Like an Icon. It begins- yawn- with ‘looking for the real Madonna.” Straight off the bat we’re subjected to such obvious revelations as ‘her work is her life.”
Still, O’Brien is a great writer and a thorough researcher, and with so much written out there in speculation of the Madonna mystery, it’s no surprise that coming up with an original thesis is nearly impossible. Her engaging book was a nice trip back down memory lane, tying Madonna’s work and inspirations into chronological order. It offered some pleasant analysis on why a half-naked woman became a feminist icon, and what exactly she did that so appealed to a gay audience. There were anecdotes showing the kind of work or creative process that went into various videos, and how different collaboration ideas came about. While squeezing several hundred songs, videos, tours, fashion shoots, and the most elaborate concert scenarios ever into a few hundred pages is impossible, I did enjoy the book. It could have been aptly titled Brush Up on Your Madonna.
Still, I’m left wondering if I’m the only one on the whole planet besides Camille Paglia who understands Madonna. Because all of this ‘who’s that girl stuff is kind of silly when the answer is right under our nose. It’s there for all to see. Madonna IS each and every aspect of all her incarnations. Reaching way back, Madonna is the virgin and the whore. She is the mother and the pop star. She is the haughty lordess of the manor, hunting pheasants, and she is the rider. She is one of the boys at the Brit pubs, and she is the perfectionist dancer. She is the intellectual, and she is the student. By now every last fan and most of her detractors should know that Madonna represents our entire culture- the selfish and the heroic. She is the mega star of the world because she encompasses everything about our culture. Someone had to be the embodiment of our times. Her evolution from narcissistic pop tart, brazenly offering up crazy ideas and making them work, to a woman with more power than most world politicians is not random. I for one believe in fate, and this Michigan girl had no choice, really, when she was appointed to act as a mirror of public consciousness, and then as a catalyst for us to take action. But how can you be a pinup girl and a world ambassador at the same time? Hmm, not everyone sees a contradiction there.
Madonna is omniscient, pervading every part of world consciousness, including the remote corners of the earth. Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel, a good book once said. Other, Kabalistic prophecies mention neat stuff like the female counterpart to past prophets, one whose influence constantly changes the world. This might be an amazing metaphor to spur you and me into living our dreams, daring, being beautiful, being fearless, taking risks, living with courage, recovering from mistakes, finding spiritual truth, and hitting the dance floor to de-stress.
Or it might be something more literal. I’m likely not the only one who sees Madonna –yes, that’s her real name in case anyone hadn’t ever made the connection or thought she made it up- as a goddess. And look, how she was born Catholic and then made popular an unusual strain of Jewish wisdom, the Kabala. Could she be a part of the master plan? I’m probably not the only one who wonders if Madonna is the Lady Messiah.
Visit the writer Lorette C. Luzajic at www.thegirlcanwrite.net.
Order her book The Astronaut’s Wife: Poems of Eros and Thanatos, online through indigo or amazon.
Misery loves company. Indeed, I’m not the only one who was bored out of my mind during The Canadian Stage Company’s Misery. The sweet grey-haired couple beside me didn’t bother returning after intermission, and likely not because they were offended.
Dullsville.
I was reluctant to discuss the disappointment with my friend, lest I offend the two actors and the theatre. Really, everyone seemed nice enough, confident and competent. An art snob I am not, and I’m quite cheerful to enjoy people’s work even when it’s not my cup of tea. I’m just not that critical, which might be why I don’t yet have full-time status as a critic. It matters not: who says all walks of contributions can’t dazzle me? Who says I can’t like many varieties of expression?
That said, I’m never timid about blurting out what’s on my mind, for better or for worse, and quite happy to give my opinion at any prompting. But I really didn’t want to hurt or offend the duo. They were, after all, stuck on an eerily modern set. It resembled nothing of that bizarre, remote little cottage Stephen King described so atmospherically in his career’s most brilliant novel. Misery. At least they could have borrowed Marge Simpson corn-cob curtains. Or a few garden rakes and a shovel to prop against the outside wall.
Plus, I doubt that even Meryl Streep with Brad Pitt could wring any intrigue out of the stilted, tiresome dialogue by adaptor Simon Moore. Honestly, I was thinking that if I can’t make a living writing reviews, perhaps I could by writing plays. No experience, but I’m quite confident I could outshine this ditty without much sweating. Nicola Cavendish and Tom McCamus did their damnedest. When the half-audience that had bothered to return after the intermission rose in a half-hearted standing ovation, I couldn’t bring myself to join them. It felt like we were standing to express how sorry we felt for the actors.
Yep, all in all, it was unbearably uneventful. Shouldn’t be- we were all creeped right out by the most terrifying of all Stephen King stories, the one that didn’t involve any supernatural spectacles, aliens, demons, or critters. Just a crippled writer and the psycho who loves him.
Also, there’s at least one revelation post-writtem that could make a play relevant or at least interesting some 15 plus years after it was written. In King’s autobiographical book On Writing, he revealed the hell of cocaine addiction, something he had tried to exorcise in this book. Misery was a crazy force that you hated, that crippled you, bound you, beat you, and lied to you, but it was your fault anyhow that you were in that position. “Annie was coke, Annie was booze, and I decided I was tired of being Annie’s pet writer,” said King. “Creative people probably DO run a greater risk of alcoholism and addiction than those in some other jobs, but so what? We all look pretty much the same when we’re puking in the gutter.”
I’m always interested to understand another artist or thinker’s interpretation of addiction. But within minutes of the play it was clear that director David Storch and assistant director Briana Brown had no idea about this undercurrent. Nor did they try to find an alternate source of tension. In the first five minutes, we saw that Annie was going to seesaw between sweet and sicko fairly predictably. We surmised it unlikely that the half-paralyzed writer guy would have a hard time escaping from this isolated cabin, or rather, the Home Depot Shed department trying to mimic the Metropolis set. When the intermission lights abruptly signaled that it was time for a champagne quickie, a rather hopeful confusion seemed to sweep over the audience mood. Was that …the end…and it’s …over? Oh, what time is it? Oh…another hour plus. Sigh. I could be watching Law and Order.
Come to think of it, if I were watching Law and Order, I’d be on the edge of my seat. Oh, how I yearned then for the edge of my seat! What kind of crime, intrigue and obsession story could be boring, even if it were silly or overly dramatic? It really feels here like nobody but the great Canadian actors even bothered, even tried.
So save your money for Nicola Cavendish’s next role- perhaps as Estella Carroll, a Victoria B.C. brothel owner in 1878? I can’t wait.
And save your evening to stay home and reread King’s modern masterpiece. I guess there are just some things you don’t want to fuck with.
Visit writer Lorette C. Luzajic at www.thegirlcanwrite.net.
Order her book online at indigo or amazon.
Three Wise Men
May 19, 2008
When a beloved friend wrote from overseas to say he was “drowning in melancholy,” I wondered sadly what had already happened to the wave of super-optimism that flashed briefly earlier this year. I had surged with a sense of possibility, creatively, and knew a rush of hope for the environmental and social disaster our world has become. It seemed that the wave was universal, and headlines everywhere proclaimed the urgency of the planet’s welfare.
And then…what goes up, must come down. Can we really effect change at all? Does the ripple effect even have time to…well, ripple- before we run out of water? Can we actually feed the kids who are starving, solve the greenhouse effect, control cancer, replenish the soil’s minerals, and live without racial, gender or other prejudices? Truth is, I doubt it.
My Germanic intellectual pragmatism says even if we magically get it all right tonight, all of us, everywhere, and start dedicated action first thing in the morning, we can’t stop fate. There’s not enough water and too many chemicals and drugs. We can’t agree with our next-door neighbours on which God is right, if any, and what to do with the local homeless. So we’ll never agree with the hundreds of other countries and their pressing agendas. War has prevailed from the beginning of history, and so have gluttony, greed, rape, and murder.
So pervading my emotional self, the one that exhilarates in finding meaning in coincidences and hope in love’s possibilities, the girl who trusts in transcendent mythic journeys, and believes in signs, portents, and spiritual dimensions, the manic, elated producer of an overflowing fountain of art and poetry that can only come from pure soul-pervading that is a more practical self. It’s the “me” that knows the gig is up no matter what we do, at least in this world.
Then, another aspect joins in the chorus of the ever-churning mind: the sardonic, cynical smartass in me knows that fate will wink when sheer weeks before running out of air to breathe and the whole of us choking on atoms of manufactured plastic crap clogging our lungs, a sun storm will gobble us up the way thousands of planets disappear into the sun all the time. A natural, cosmic occurrence of gases and flames will make moot our bent on self-destruction.
Oops, so much for trying.
So what’s the point then, you ask? What’s the point of getting up in the morning and reveling in thankfulness for the clear, sunny day? What’s the point in going to work or school and fulfilling your potential? What’s the point in recycling or attending NA meetings? Why not fuel up on hydrogenated poisons? Why bother completing a painting, or giving life-saving surgery, or sponsoring a child in Ecuador?
I never understood clearly when I was a kid why my dad told me the reason for doing the right thing is simply because it is right. Simple, but hard for me to get a handle on. Dad: the reason you should do the right thing is because it is the right thing to do. Here as an adult, I’m still way too attached to the outcome. You can’t control shit, but you’re still 100 per cent responsible for the stuff you do. So do your damn best.
Responsible to whom, you ask? I can’t answer that. I may not believe what you do. But there’s right and wrong and though humans have never been good at figuring it out, there are a few we all agree on without argument- be kind to old ladies and don’t kill and torture people, for example. You may not be able to change what your politicians do, but asking them to do it is still your responsibility. What might happen if we all wake up and feel possibility and demand to stop the ridiculous greed and killing? The sun may still fulfill the prophecy that the world will not be destroyed by flood again-or it may not. But every day lived from here on in will be lived fuller, better, stronger, more amazing. I’m going to try my very best.
The friend who wrote how he is drowning in melancholy I have known for a long, long time, (he is now a Buddhist monk) and I know from his cycles that soon he will write with the understanding that occasional submerging in despair is a quiet, dark time of the soul that lies in wait of answers. Paul McCartney: “Let it be, let it be, let it be, let it be, there will be an answer, let it be….”
My friend is on the other side of the world, and we are not able to be together right now on our divergent paths, but his thoughts mirror mine today as he writes, “ I cannot give up on spiritual life until I have exhausted every last possibility.”
Another of my most trusted spiritual advisors I have never met, brilliant thinker Thomas Moore, who wrote about despair in Dark Nights of the Soul. “Imagination is everything,” he reminds me in case my practical self doubted what my heart believes so wholly. “Because we can’t know or experience anything outside our imagination of it. But the imagination can be old, tired, and irrelevant. It needs to be revived continually.”
Lorette C. Luzajic
thegirlcanwrite.net
you can order my book through amazon or indigo online!
Forget about pretending to wade through pretentious literary smut from the old boy’s club, boring tomes by Henry Miller and Norman Mailer. Boys will be boys, and we aren’t boys. Chick lit is booming, and signs and banners loudly and proudly summon the pink brigade to overflowing tables and shelves.
I confess I resisted the lady-lite trend in reading for years…while the name never offended me as it did some, I boldly declared that ‘chick lit’ was everything in the world a girl might read, from Shakespeare to the giantesses like Isabel Allende and Margaret Atwood. I’ve just never had a thing for what they used to call the ‘sex and shopping’ stories.
But that was before we all got caught reading Bridget Jones’ Diary, an infectious romp through feminine insecurity that reminded me of my childhood favourite, The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged Thirteen and Three Quarters. While neither books would change the world, both showcased the self-conscious human spirit with a bit of verve and a million truly funny and totally familiar moments. Easy to digest, to be sure, but genuinely funny. Still, I was a bit of an art snob when the Shopaholic craze began. I worked in the bookstore, and we barely sold any other titles. But my roommate then was The Professor, an Egyptian radical who spoke six languages and boasted nearly as many university degrees. He was teaching and researching theology, and he wanted to talk about Coptic Christianity or the modernization of Jewish art. I would have been embarrassed to drop brand names, so I read Karen Armstrong’s sweeping and brilliant religious histories, for which I am not sorry.
Still, I had a secret penchant for Lucky: the Magazine About Shopping- and I still do. Who wouldn’t wile away the hours, circling their favourite objects, reading small blurbs about what eye shadows would make blue peepers pop this spring? My paparazzi would seldom find me in a mall- I’m a Goodwill girl at heart (well, now that I’m thirtysomething, it’s a mix of Goodwill and Winners!) But the Sophie Kinsella series, Confessions of a Shopaholic, did worm its way eventually into my curious hands. Like everyone else on the planet, I was immediately hooked. The formula was pure pop, and a winning one. Going shopping with Rebecca Bloomwood was far more fun than real-life shopping. I didn’t run into any crowds, I didn’t have to look at my sausage thighs in badly lit mirrors; I didn’t have to choose wisely. Even better, the appealing heroine never ran out of damn good one-liners, was clever and funny, and always getting into ridiculous escapades. And what girl doesn’t love an escapade? 
It had been awhile since I’d devoured any escapadist fiction- and after a stretch of acceptably pompous prize winners and a whole heap of nonfiction as per usual, I picked up Getting Rid of Matthew by Jane Fallon. Unlike Entertainment Weekly, I would hardly declare this a ‘gritty look at the madness of never knowing exactly what you want.’ I doubt that in six months I’ll recall even having read it. But no matter: not every book must shatter the earth, and this indulgent and often funny story looks at what to do after your dreams land in your lap and you don’t want it anymore.
Every girl can relate to the splintering revelation of her man’s humanity- yes, boys, first you are gods, exactly where you want to be. If you want to stay that way in our eyes, it’s pretty simple: don’t lie and cheat, don’t patronize, and don’t leave your mess all over our apartment. These things erode the mystery far too quickly, and then you complain that we no longer want sex. For me that math is easy- the fewer six-month socks I find on my floor, and the fewer farts and belches I hear, the friskier you will find me. Men don’t always see what their other girlfriends or drinking out of the milk carton have to do with sex, but if they’d like more of it, it would be wise to catch on soon.
That said, even though Matthew is a serial cheater who tends to tomcat during a wife’s pregnancy, there are moments I genuinely feel sorry for him. Women’s oceanic moods are not always predictable, and no matter how hot your secretary is, moving in with her may not be the dreamy steamy lifestyle you were anticipating. Even the hottest, curviest, horniest babes in the world get periods and babies, and though men can handle the carcasses of war, they have a hard time with a tampon or a stretch mark. So while Matthew indeed deserves everything that his wife and his girlfriend have coming to him, at times I can’t help cringing in embarrassment for the poor aging sod. Still, he made his bed; he’ll have to lie in it.
But Getting Rid of Matthew is not really about man-hating. It’s about the inherent comedy in our gender foibles. Helen is nearly forty, and has been Matthew’s other woman for four years. Living in a tiny basement in London, working as a secretary, and being childless, with nothing but another woman’s man to show for her life, she understandably feels she has achieved none of the status or accomplishment a woman is supposed to have by now. But in the end, she sees how amazing her life is after all. There is much to be said for coming home to your own flat, pouring a few glasses of wine all by your lonesome, and doing whatever the hell you want. Such freedom has indeed been rare for women throughout history.
And so, although the book itself was rather mediocre, I closed it with a brand new relish for the life I’ve made in my humble abode- my cats, my books, and me. Now this is living.
Getting Rid of Matthew by Jane Fallon, Harper Collins, New York, 2007
Visit Lorette C. Luzajic at www.thegirlcanwrite.net.
Her book, The Astronaut’s Wife: Poems of Eros and Thanatos, is available through Indigo or Amazon. Check it out.
By chance lately, the fields I’m researching in food and nutrition topics have brought a great deal of emotional conflict to light, mine and the rest of the world’s. I used to cry over the lies told to me by the beef industry, and so I was a vegetarian for five years. Too bad it made me sick as a dog and I didn’t even know it: it did feel good spiritually to avoid a contribution to animal suffering. Now I’m an omnivore again, just as Mother Nature dictated, and shocked all anew by another big bad business: the soy industry. In case you don’t yet know it, vegetarian or meat-eater I don’t care- soy is a big fat lie and in fact it is a poisonous plant. But that’s another story, coming soon. I love vegetables, and I probably eat more vegetables and more kinds of them than most vegetarians, but I was also shocked and frightened recently to find out that a wholesome friend like grain may be the cause of both the rise and fall of civilization.
So here I am, in a state of disillusion, working diligently to study all sides of these controversies as I piece together what the hell humans are supposed to put into our mouths. And that’s when I was presented with a copy of VegNews Magazine, a highly recommended vegetarian lifestyle magazine. Juicy dish on big issues, food, cooking and hip modern living cheerfully resound from every page. It’s never boring and many of the articles are surprisingly well rounded.
Indeed, I was pleased to see a great discussion about choosing childlessness. I choose not to own a car- owning one in downtown Toronto is an expensive, unethical lifestyle choice that is easily avoided. It was nice to see childlessness acknowledged as an ethical ‘green’ option. Of course I support breeders- let’s face it, it’s natural to desire offspring and a family, and no matter how overpopulated the world is. Human nature will dictate what most of us will find fulfilling. There’s also the fact that children…just happen… more often than not, and their lives are precious. But I’m sick of being told that childless couples or individuals are to be pitied, or worse, that they are selfish. How can it be selfish to choose not to introduce a new consumer of the earth’s resources? How can it be selfish to choose my part in shielding another living soul from the sorrow and chaos and suffering in the world? It was refreshing to see this issue considered as a positive choice in our evolution. Those longing for children still have options….literally, millions of options. Adoption is a remarkable thing, and I can’t imagine why people would have their own child instead of adopting one who needs a home…unless, of course, it happens, which is the unfortunate tyranny of nature.
A story about the evils of pet food manufacturers was also very interesting, showing some enthusiastic investigation into contaminants and shady business practices.
Still, I was disappointed throughout the magazine. I realize it’s not a magazine for omnivores, so who am I to comment? But then again, must vegans pass passé propaganda back and forth to each other, without critically examining reality?
I can and will argue that the cases against meat eating are feeble and woefully misguided, but I have to wholeheartedly respect another adult’s decision to eat without cruelty.
The keyword here is ‘adult.’ Any discussion of raising vegan children gets my ire up- yes, yes, meat is contaminated and yada yada…so head to your local Mennonite farm or farmer’s market and pick hormone-free, free-range products (and while you’re at it, detox the hormone-saturated soy products from your fridge before your son grows breasts.) It’s one thing to make a sacrifice or a commitment of your choosing and vote for a cruelty-free diet- but acting as if humans have not been omnivores for millions of years is kind of like pushing your head into the sand and leaving it there. Many argue that chimps are vegetarians, and as we share 99 per cent of their DNA, we are also ‘supposed to be’ vegetarians. Then it is argued that ‘most people’ worldwide are vegetarian. Actually, our brains are made up of DHA- fish stuff- and we might still be chimpanzees if we didn’t start eating fish and animal protein as a species. And in fact, there are nearly no vegetarian human societies throughout all of history- except for religious cultures. Vegans- almost none. Veganism is a brand new way of life, and though some individuals have chosen this historically, there aren’t many groups of people who ate zero animal products. Anywhere. Period. Nearly every traditional society of the world eats meat- some almost exclusively! I’ll respect your choice to avoid dead animals if you acknowledge science and anthropology, and don’t give me any crap about feeding infants nothing but apple juice or soy milk.
So yeah, I did get pissed when in the middle of a wonderful story on overpopulation, adoption, and childlessness, one woman writes. “And who is to say your child will not decide to become carnivorous at some point in their life? We ultimately have no control over that.”
First of all, lady, no one ‘becomes’ carnivorous. You can only ‘become’ vegetarian. You are already carnivorous. Second, desiring a natural diet is not a dirty secret. If you can’t love a child for her nature, then yes, you better absolutely refuse to have one.
My ire continued when the pet food story tried to dole out the usual propaganda about vegan food being better for dogs and cats. To be fair, there was some half-hearted acknowledgement that cats ‘might’ need meat. Umm, hello? Yeah. I don’t care if you don’t want to pay for meat. Then you cannot have this type of pet. Plain and simple. It’s extremely naïve to impose your diet decisions on another species, born meat eaters. If you are against animal cruelty, how can you even entertain the idea of forcing grains and vegetables on animals that don’t eat them? This left me scratching my head and feeling as if that ‘vegans are evil’ website I stumbled upon, that pissed me off for knocking someone’s choice and ethics, might have something to say after all.
Then there was Dan Piraro asking, “Would you bang a burger eater?” I was hoping for an intelligent and amusing column on the perils of dual-camp hook-ups. Instead I get this ridiculously pompous side note: “Meat eating humans often call themselves ‘carnivores,’ but this is a misnomer. A carnivore is a scientific classification for animals with specific physical characteristics and which require meat to survive.” (Let me inject my own side note here- “Oh, Dan, you must be talking about…CATS. Cats are carnivores.”) He continues, “Humans are not in this category and bear no resemblance to animals that are. Humans who eat meat are masquerading as carnivores, make-believe carnivores, carnivore wannabes.”
Ummm, excuse me?
It doesn’t matter what the rest of the world does- even if every last person ate meat, you surely don’t have to do anything you damn well don’t want to, Dan. If you want to walk on your hands instead of your feet, go nuts. If you want to eat wonderful plant foods, invite me over for dinner. If you want to eat metal scrapings, then don’t. But don’t tell me- or anyone- that I’m a ‘make believe carnivore.’ Because while the world stats don’t mean you should take up eating any food you find cruel or distasteful, they do surely tell the truth about what we are: carnivores. Humans are hunter-gatherers. We are also inventive, and found all kinds of options for eating, some amazing, some vile.
Vegetarians like to use the chimpanzee example, and then say ‘half the world is vegetarian.’ Is it true? No. The most vegetarians are in religious countries. Hindus don’t eat cow. Moslems and Jews don’t eat pork (but are not vegetarian.) India has a high vegetarian population, perhaps one of the highest in the world. Stats are hard to pin down, but roughly 15 per cent. How many vegans? Almost NONE.
In first world countries like the US and UK, where choice is king, most choose meat. Only 3-4 percent are vegetarians. Less than one per cent are vegan. That’s in UK and North America, where there are more vegans per capita than any other place in the world, which brings the number of vegans worldwide down to something like 0.00004 per cent.
Today there are huge hunger problems around the world. Those begging for food cannot be choosers. But what about historically? Historically, there were no vegan societies, and vegetarian societies were nearly always religious ones.
You go and tell the Masai warriors or the Eskimos that they are make-believe carnivores.
Thing is, some of these clowns actually will. As if the anthropology of a million years of winter dwelling didn’t have it’s own wisdom. As if you can actually grow plants in the snow, and even if you could! As if those African tribal societies that still hunt and eat meat (and drink blood) almost exclusively have not been incredibly healthy.
Finally, I thought the last page- What’s in Your Fridge?- was a clever idea. But looking into this cookbook author’s fridge, I was saddened. No, there were no Cheetos, no Big Macs, no Sara Lees. But the produce was still relegated to the bottom drawer, and the fridge was brimming with plastic jars and boxes of ‘health food.’ A whole sick market of unfood has blossomed out of vegetarianism, and the sad thing is that the eaters think it’s healthy stuff. Like I said, I have more vegetables than most vegans in my kitchen. If it has to be bottled up, packaged, processed, and boxed, it barely resembles the food it once was. Now we all need the odd glass jar for our tomato sauce or our mustard. But this fridge was bursting at the seams with jars of…junk food- with healthy sounding names. Why are so many vegans scared of produce? I’m not.
Now that all of that is off my chest, I’m still going to invite you all to pick up a copy of VegNews. First, I have to applaud them for being open-minded enough to write a story on the soy debate. I will have to rush to get that back copy before I can comment, but most veg mags won’t even consider the mounting evidence that soy business is just as dirty as beef business. This issue featured a letter to the editor, whining that the mag would publish ‘farmer’s’ propaganda against soy, and like most vegans, never considered they are being duped by the biggest farm industry of them all: soy. The only reason we think soy is healthy is because the soy industry told us to. Kudos to a magazine for the kind of inquisitive journalism that can at least present information possibilities that might lead people to truth…especially when soy is known to pull ads from offending free speechers. The impact of this type of press muzzling can’t be underestimated: alternative presses, even successful ones, are desperate for revenue, and I respect them for bringing the issue up.
And while this type of story might help seekers find alternate vegetable proteins and cure some health problems, it’s not just veggies who can benefit from broadening their minds. We all can. A little awareness of animal cruelty can go a long way for us carnivores- perhaps the torture/factory farm exposes will encourage us to buy wisely from ethical farms and companies. We may be inspired to incorporate more vegetables- and thus, more panache- into our meals. Both teams would be wise to remember the ‘live and let live’ mandate of spiritual living: we might become vegetarian for health, or like me, we might come back to nature for health reasons (no one with thyroid disease should be eating soy products, vegetarian or not.) Meat eaters and vegetarians never have and never will see eye to eye, but we still share the planet. I would rather celebrate the foods we do share together instead of focusing on the ones we don’t. Let’s work toward respecting our ideologies, even if they differ, and respect the facts as facts. Isn’t this the first step to peace?
Now you all know I get hot under the collar when asked for my opinion and that I tend to ramble on and on. Diana Wilson, also a lapsed vegetarian, and a brilliant writer, said it all better in My Vegetarian Affair, an article from the food issue of Maisonneuve (winter 2007). She became a vegetarian because she didn’t want to eat dead things- same as me. Seventeen years later, she randomly opened a tin of tuna. “I was tired of being tired,” she writes, “of popping pills to ward off chronic anemia.” In this brief, fascinating article she examines the emotional punch behind humans eating. She highlights our cultural revulsion. She says that food choices defy reason. “In North America, we eat sardines, but not goldfish…We eat cow, but nor horse.” We don’t eat fly larvae like the Japanese, or other insects, which are common and deeply nutritious fare around the world. We don’t even eat for nutrition, though we like to think we do. How many of us choose Cheetos, or Diet Coke—all those healthy vegans cracking open the Diet Coke right after the speech about the big bad beef company and the perils of saturated fat. Mmm, real healthy. Wilson sums up the stark reality of it all: “We will eat what we want to eat.”
So there it is.
VegNews Magazine
www.vegnews.com
Visit writer Lorette C. Luzajic at www.thegirlcanwrite.net.
I’ve always thought my intense need for solitude was a little in the opposite direction from social norms. I blamed it on the obvious- as an artist, I’m a little weird. We have unconventional relationships, intense friendships, and need alone time to create. Just like couples need time to procreate.
Though some of my romance has been tumultuous, that’s just making up for the long stretches in which it is absent.
Since I was a wee thing, I enjoyed my own company very much, and lived in my own little world much of the time. But not all of it, and so I didn’t worry. I am definitely not a loner. I am frequently surrounded with a steady buzz, with bells and whistles, with family drama, the odd date. I’m not exactly a loner, given that I have an amazing cast of friends all over the world. Not everybody likes me, of course, and I surely do not like everybody else. But I like a lot of people, and I like a lot of people very much.
Now you all know the store I put in coincidences- there aren’t any. Just after my birthday, I had a Tarot-inspired epiphany. It was all about The Hermit, and how much work I was going to get done this year because fate has it that I’m not hooking up this year and that’s just fine with me. I sure don’t want to rule out any spicy companionship that may arise, but I’m not exactly waiting for the phone to ring or picking up ye old Rules, either. And that’s when someone told me I was the frigging poster child for quirkyalone.
Hmm, I liked everything I knew about quirkyalone except the moniker, which I found intolerably cheesy. It was just way too cutesy and cheerful for me to wear on a t-shirt or anything, and my brief forays into the quirkyalone movement were, well, brief. Still, what I’d found there impressed me duly. It wasn’t about bitterness and antisocial eccentricity. It was an openhearted embrace of solitude or singleness. It was deeply creative, humourous, tolerant, and inquisitive. When my flippant friend made that smart remark, my mind recalled picking up the book at the bookstore and putting it back down. Guess that hadn’t been the time, and this is.
Quirkyalone: a manifesto for uncompromising romantics by Sasha Cagen is a book about people who don’t settle. They may be serially single, or single indefinitely. And though they have their moments that they miss being missus, (or mister), they usually aren’t crying home alone on Friday night. They’re making sushi or going dancing. They’re turning off the phone ‘cause they’re in the middle of a giant abstract and a nice bottle of chardonnay. They have no interest in being set up. Time in between, before, or after, or instead of a partner is time to grow spiritually and creatively, to study, to emerge.
The book Quirkyalone is awesome. I will say that the book has even more of that cutesy thing going on then the title does. It feels a little overzealous most of the time. But I am utterly refreshed by the lack of cynicism, by the innate intelligence and creative ingenuity of the writer and of the featured quirkyalones. And I was joyfully surprised to find a rather long list of my icons listed as famous quirkyalones, including Nina Simone and Jesus.
The best part of the book was how much it resonated with my value system. Cagen places incredible importance on friendship, celebrates it as sacred and special. I have often thought that friendship, the chosen bond, is at least as meaningful as romance and family, and often more enduring. But it gets the short end of the stick, more often than not, or isn’t recognized as a unique form of relationship. Pairing up always trumps friendship as a family value, and friends get ditched or neglected by the formation of couples. Yet isn’t friendship far more enduring? Don’t many more friendships last a lifetime than marriages? And wouldn’t it be best to marry a friend with chemistry or even without, than whatever seems suitable at a suitable age?
Quirkyalone readers may respond enthusiastically to this jazzy declaration of independence. But let’s talk about sex. The obvious thing about relationships that friendship might not provide is sex. Even pathological loners may need sexual intimacy or pleasure from time to time. What do you do with all this aloneness when it comes to sex?
Well, quirkyalones could make like the rest of the population and pair up happily or miserably and call it love when it’s just the necessary biological boink they’re after. But the quirkyalone is committed to live with integrity. Cagen explains that he or she isn’t out to bash traditional pairings, to avoid love, or to ignore sex. “Uncompromising romantics” simply can’t commit their life to someone unsuitable. They can’t live a lie. And for some, living sexless is a lie, and for others, hooking up is a lie. How to live morally and still fulfill the built in needs humans have for sexual gratification?
Let’s face it- we are all sexual beings to some level, but we can all admit the least satisfying experiences are those where we lied or were lied to over some fleeting physicality. Our society is prudish and sex-obsessed at the same time. The quirkyalone ignores the hype. They know they don’t have to be skinny or fergalicious to be attractive, and aren’t chasing that Friday night date slot with cellulite creams and bronzers. We all recall the stunning and dark film Dead Man Walking, where Sean Penn is a hardened asshole on death row. The difficult friendship between the nun played by Susan Sarandon and the murderer was compelling content. As their special relationship unfolded, the thug asked her how she could be celibate. “Don’t you miss having a man?” Mattie asks seductively. “Don’t you want to get married, fall in love, have sex?” Sister Jean responds, “l haven’t experienced sexual intimacy, but there’s other ways of being close.” She says she has many close friends, both men and women.
It’s true that the never-ending hunt for booty with which we live our lives, even unconsciously, leads us more often away from real intimacy than toward it. How many of us are still with the first, second, or third love that we sobbed over for weeks or years? How many can even remember who that was? Yet no doubt we ditched our real friends in hopes that Jane, Sue, or Bob had time for us. We primped and preened and shaved and plucked.
Many quirkyalones are celibate, or are not afraid of periods of celibacy. They can be a welcome stretch where quirkyalones avoid distraction and insanity and energize their friendships, their commitments to church life or volunteer work, or their creative projects. But Cagen is quick to point out that quirkyalone is quite the opposite of hard up. Often, a quirkyalone has many suitors, but chooses his or her own company, or the tried and true companionship of his friends or furry critters. Celibacy is just one option, though. There are as many types of liaisons, arrangements, and sexy partnerships as the imagination can conjure. And now that we have left the assumption that a person should have a specific, traditional, agenda, the tried and un-true blueprint for social merging, we have a whole banquet of possibilities. It may be challenging to navigate the social alternatives, but not nearly as challenging as a lifetime of picking up crusty socks and enduring the assault on your identity that may happen if one succumbs to the wrong partner just because she’s there. 
So. The quirkyalone loves to be alone, loves his friendships, enjoys her hobbies, and is not a nun (or may be a nun. Some nuns are surely quirkyalone. Marrying God is definitely quirky.) They are realistic about finding a life mate because they know a good match may be unlikely or unreasonable and they aren’t planning to settle. What happens when a quirkyalone finds someone?
Yep, it’s the quirkytogether… recall Cagen’s subtitle “a manifesto for uncompromising romantics.” Cagen addresses head on how the quirkyalone can go from single solitude and celibacy to impulsively married in a heartbeat. She explains that because the feelings come along so seldom, that when they do, they are so strong they border on obsession. She talks the quirkyalone back to earth, cautioning the avoidance of stalking and other erratic behaviours like eloping that may result. Because falling for someone is no guarantee for regular people and it’s no guarantee for the quirkyalone either. Even if one or both parties has fallen ‘madly in love.’
“It’s a little known fact, but quirkyalones, for all their independence, also have a tendency to be swept away when they get close to love. We are passionate, romantic characters, and that click happens so rarely that the hunt for a partner can sometimes take on the character of a hunt for the holy grail. If you meet someone who stirs your interest only once every two years, it’s bound to be an epic event,” Cagen writes. There are a few pages that expound on ‘romantic obsession’ and talk the quirkyalone back into reality. And to help guide the quirkyalone into a quirkytogether bliss, Cagen reminds her readers to remember that both parties are distinct individuals, that they are not a ‘we,’ that each should maintain healthy friendships outside the relationship, that each should maintain their own interests, and that they should never, ever send out holiday cards with a Sears and Santa portrait or themselves on the cover.
And that about covers it. This truly unique manual is ‘self-help’ of the best kind. It’s about the self, but it’s not selfish. It’s not about blaming the parents or a bad ex. It’s about celebration, about coming to terms with an unconventional life. It’s about how normal that really is, despite the media and the status quo. While it may seem obvious that this book is not for everyone, I say it is. You may not be remotely quirkyalone, but some of your friends may be. This can open your mind to how he or she works, and you can stop trying to set him up with the girls in your office. You may date one, and you’ll know when the time comes that she needs time alone, not ‘time without you.’
And so, what about me? Do I feel like the poster child for quirkyalone now that I’ve read the manifesto? I would have said no and stuck with ‘artist’ because I’m a bitter old queen who loathes chirpy labels. But I can’t lie. I did the quiz I found online, and I did the quiz in the book. And on both I got perfect. 100 per cent quirkyalone.
“At long last. You have found your tribe, a brave breed to resist the tyranny of coupledom in favor of independent self-expression. Relatives may give you quizzical looks, and so may coworkers, but in your heart of hearts, you know that you are following your inner voice. You may or may not be participating in a conventional romance, but always you are romancing the world.”
So there it is.
Quirkyalone: a manifesto for uncompromising romantics
Harper Collins, New York, 2004.
Visit writer Lorette C. Luzajic at www.thegirlcanwrite.net for more blogs, more stories, and more art. Please order my book The Astronaut’s Wife: Poems of Eros and Thanatos.
