Broke-o-vich

From now on I’m only doing things as if I’m Erin Brockovich. Or Julia Roberts as Erin Brockovich. I am going to hand-deliver all important documents. I am going to take my comedy door-to-door. I'm going to perform for desk clerks at every county water board. And when someone says they won’t sign a contract, I am going to warm their heart by carrying a baby. Does anybody have a baby?

I woke up yesterday wishing I was married, thinking, "Wow, it would be nice to hold someone right now. But would they be grossed out that I just sneezed into my Strawberry Shortcake beach towel? Wait, I wouldn't have done that in front of another person."

Because here's thing: Living alone, I feel like a wolf. Just an animal. I can do as a please, leave whatever wherever,
say anything aloud without judgement.

Like once I was dating this guy and I was at his place checking my email, saw something I didn't like and said, "Dammit!" He asked, "What's wrong?" And I thought, 'If I were alone right now, I would never have given my reaction a second thought. It's just that now there's an observer...'

By they way, I washed the towel. There's some girl in apartment fifteen who never smiles and she was taking her clothes out of the dryer, folding them very slowly. I said, "Hey, can I squeeze in and throw my stuff in the wash?" She paused, and with this all-knowing motherly glance, she goes, "I'll be done in a couple minutes," like she needed to be alone in the laundry room to fold her socks?! Ughhhhh. I wanted to go back and ask, "Is your life so bad that you need to control the laundry room?" I also have this new neighbor who has a ton of tattoos up his legs and a forest green sheet covering his window. Forest green reminds me of every guy's bedroom in high school and a sweatshirt that around the same time I wanted from Eddie Bauer. When you're young and you tell people you like a color, you start getting everything in that color.

It happens with cartoon characters, too. I have a friend who said she liked Mickey Mouse and now she has a Mickey Mouse teapot, Mickey Mouse towels, a Mickey Mouse toothbrush. All she needs to complete the theme is for Mickey Mouse to come over and shit on her bathmat. There's a time in your life when people think you're going to start making money, or get married, and that you'll get to replace all the old stuff you have. But sometimes that takes awhile and you're stuck with the same things you like when you were eighteen. You still have the holey plastic crates and the paper cranes and the lava lamp. And the Strawberry Shortcake towel.

Here's one of my favorite parts in Erin Brockovich: When Erin brings her boyfriend to tell the very sick woman that she's getting five million dollars. Her boyfriend says, "I still don't understand why you want me to come with you." And Erin says, "I want you to see what you helped me do."

I want to be able to say that to someone. My equivalent: Dragging someone out to a show in the valley and saying, "I want you to see what you helped me do." Then afterward would they ask me to sign an I.O.U.?

I do need money, by the way. I keep avoiding the topic of rent with my landlady by bringing up Swine Flu.

O Life!