Strippr

If you’re one of those girls that has to talk about how much blow you do, you probably aren’t mature enough to be doing blow.

The great internal, eternal debate about whether to work tonight or not has begun.

I’m not sore from my race on Saturday. At least, not really sore enough to use it as an excuse not to work. After long, soothing massages from the boyfriend afterward and plenty of stretching, I feel fairly normal. 12 hours of sleep last night in a new bed didn’t hurt, either.

But, I did run the furthest distance I’ve yet covered on Saturday. That’s kind of a big deal. It’s no marathon, but 15.6mi is quite a distance for a newbie runner. I’m guessing that even if I’m not all that sore, my legs probably need a rest, both from running and dancing.

I need the money. Boo. Rent’s due (short month), I don’t really have any groceries, and I need new sheets for the bed I just got (it’s bigger than the last one I had).

But really, my anxiety about it is all from last week’s stupid fucking comment.

I feel like crap about myself.

It doesn’t matter how smart, or sweet, or fit, or kind, or good I am at my job. My job is about how my body looks.

I want to believe—I spend so. much. fucking. time defending—that stripping is more than just boobs and ass and skinny girls prancing and dry-humping away the night. I spend so much time believing and defending that stripping is conversation, is wit, is a personal style on stage, is makeup and hair and outfits, is effort, is physical and emotional strength, is character and personality, is all kinds of things.

Stripping is, when you get right down to it, about how titties and ass look in a miniature bikini and a pair of stilettos, a tablespoon of luck, and a pinch of not looking too high/drunk or sounding too stupid to be annoying.

Right now, I’m holding out on luck and trying to mask this body with personality and conversation that just doesn’t matter all that much at work. I want to believe, so badly, that it matters. I need to believe that it matters. But does it?

Does it?

I just signed up for work tonight.

ED-Triggery.

————-

The night started slow, but we were all hopeful. A beautiful day with a storm coming in? Recipe for good business. My first stage set, over an hour after we opened, was to an empty house, and I was only required to be physically on stage—sitting, laying, whatever. So I got 100 crunches and about 50 pushups in, in stilettos!, while laughing and chatting with the girl on stage before me.

The night picked up a little, but we never got busy. A regular showed up, chatted, and threw $100 bill on my stage; precursor to a great mood and glow-y smile for the rest of the night. He left shortly after, and I picked up my book to read for awhile. Spent a chapter on the couch, stretching and lazing around under strobes and colored lights. Catlike.

Headed for the dressing room, where a pair of girls that always come in late were just getting ready. X* asked what I was reading while I was unwrapping a half sandwich for dinner, and asked a general question about it. Dawkin’s The Greatest Show on Earth is about a million miles over her head, but I gave her a very brief explanation. Evolution is pretty cool.

She asks me, out of the blue, if I’m pregnant.

I keep both my temper and my tears (surprisingly well, all night), and return with, “No. Why?” She says she asked because I’ve gained a lot of weight. Her friend looks uncomfortable, but laughs instead. Sweet, thanks.

Gee. Thanks. I know. I explain that I quit smoking in October, and how I am bloated as fuck because I’m PMSing. It was important to me, for some reason, to explain. And ever the sweet girl she is, she returns with, “Well, I guess, congratulations either way, because it’s not like you’d say if you were pregnant, anyway.”

Instead of dropping the wrapper in the trash, I dropped the entire fucking sandwich in the trash. Apparently, this made X* feel bad. She asked over and over again to buy me a sandwich. I told her: If I was going to eat, I’d have eaten <that> sandwich.

My brain is pleading with her: I’m not usually this fat! I promise. I know, I know, I look awful. There’s a legit reason that DOESN’T involve a parasitic fetus, it’s temporary. I hope like fuck it’s temporary. Oh god. I know I look like this, okay? Do we need to go over it? It’s so bad that she had to ask THAT question. It’s the second time in four months I’ve been asked that question. I’M FUCKING TRYING, OKAY?

I know it’s been noticed.

Look, I try. I do. I never thought I’d be one of those people that works her ass off to look…well…like she doesn’t do anything at all. I know YOU can’t see that I try. I can’t see that I try! But fuck. I’m trying. Maybe not asking questions about my chubby belly in the meantime would be great. At least, I hope this is the meantime, and not some sort of permanent disfiguring situation.

I feel like I don’t deserve to be there, dancing. And maybe I don’t. But until someone fires me or I stop making money, I guess that’s my job. Right now, I really wish it wasn’t.

And the night continued with one of the owners bringing a group in to party, demanding that three girls do three separate sacrifices, not paying the girls who did the sacrifices, and recording them with his cellphone camera (and allowing others in his party to do the same, on the floor, in front of the rest of the customers). Our manager, bouncers, and DJ were frustrated with him (but can’t tell him not to do those things). The girls were frustrated with him. I am certain nothing more will be said about it.

I read. I dodged a shitty customer for hours who was wasting my time. I poured my keg-cup-style glasses of rum one-third full instead of to the designated fill-line. I wasn’t going to drink at work. I had a handful of beers, or so, but I wasn’t going to drink at work anymore. Well, I guess I’m back to drinking at work, again.

Party harder. Party the hardest.

I bought a pack of cigarettes today.

I know I haven’t been around as much as usual lately on the Internetz.

I’m frustrated with the Internet.

Everywhere I go on it, I inadvertently run into things I don’t need to hear every day (these are just from today):

• “How to lose 7 lbs fast,” and the 400 variations of this ad that I probably see when I’m online,
• “Redbook supports strippers and that’s really wrong ’cause I thinkz they’re all abused but they’re all sluts too so goddamn it my wholesome magazine shouldn’t write about ‘em!” (somehow, I envision the writer of that article to be a hick [weilding a Confederate flag on the back of his truck, in my mental picture]),
• My with disgust at the infatuation with celebrities/television/movies/shitty books,
• All of the shitty bigoted opinion pieces and “news articles” on gays/other non-hetero/white/male/middle-aged/wealthy/healthy/capable people.
• More stripper-hating, prostitution-hating, endless-fascination-with-escorts crap,
• More shit about why women should be denied birth control,
• More sex-worker-hating/pitying bullshit,
• More shit about “Linsanity” and any other variation of the word/name/etc,
• ANY. THING. ELSE. about Whitney Houston,
• Shit about why religious delusions should trump my own rights to be left the fuck alone (and why I should believe in stuff I think is diagnosably crazy),
• More sex-hating, rape-joke-promoting garbage…

Let me also say that I do not routinely visit sites that are conservative (politically), religious/”spiritual”, bigoted, fad-diet-promoting, sports-worshipping, and so on, in content. My news comes from Huffington Post. My sex worker indulgence reads come from Tits and Sass. I write on Tumblr because it’s easy, and my dash is generally clear of the nastiest of bullshit (or I happily unfollow). My Facebook friends are all generally like-minded individuals with a few oddballs that I unsubscribed. I go out of my way to live harmoniously with the Internet.

And all of this shit follows me around, anyway. It’s irritating.

The more I stay away from the Internet and television, the happier I am. Sorry for the irregular posting.

In the meantime, I’m happy to say that I’m working on two things: an FAQ page for this blog (hopefully this will answer some of the questions I get via the “ask box” fairly frequently!) and a top secret special project with Lydia.

On a better note: George Washington’s birthday is coming up! He will be 280 on February 22nd (on Wednesday, stripper pals!).

For 280 years old, this man still sees my pussy more frequently than any other man on the planet.

Pretty kickass guy, too—I’ve got about 500 pictures of him right now. I’m waitin’ for his pretty face to talk a car salesman into givin’ up the goods.

Fuck yeah. Anyone else down for celebrating?

I know that I’ll be drinking champagne and entertaining him at my nearest, dearest strip club.

Woke up this morning and refused to look out the window for an hour. Snow last night. Snow, and having to clean my car off. Snow, and my burn pit is again useless for small trash fires. Snow, and the roads are crappy in the city, because the citypeople forget how to drive (this happens every year, dozens of times a year). Snow, and work is a wild card, a coin flip, anyone’s guess. Warmth of another human being, maybe, if it isn’t outweighed by the wicked winds off of the emptied rivers and over the winter fields.

When my world starts getting too big, I hang out in my bedroom. Right now. Right now my world is too big, changing so quickly. Moving quickly. Uncertain, undeciding. I’m refusing to decide anything.

New boyfriend. Treats my job like a job. Treats me like a queen. Cooks for me, acts like a gentleman. Has a big, huge, sexy fucking brain and beats me in chess. My dog is in love with him, demands to sleep next to him, would spend all day licking his beard if she could. Electric touches, ways I’ve never been touched by a partner. He’s part of the reason I haven’t had time to write.

Work nightmares, pre-returning to work stress and anxiety. Two of them within three days, one of which included forced sex acts and coworkers morphing into other coworkers and it was one of the most vivid dreams in awhile. I had to just dive in and go back, or my brain was going to create all kinds of stress for me.

My birthday, as Lydia said, was Saturday. I spent it mostly running errands, dying my hair the wrong color (not red enough), eating with my feuding parents, and deciding that, goddamnit, I was going to go to a movie at the theater with the boyfriend and not deal with going to bars and/or getting drunk and/or telling anyone else what I was up to. Did that, fell asleep, woke up in time to tell you that “Safe House” is worth watching. Once, anyway.

Rang in my 24th birthday unceremoniously on purpose, and managed to get a load of gifts dumped on me by customers who either remembered (a massive queen-sized beautiful bed and mattress set) or knew it was close enough to Valentine’s to start bringing gifts (freshwater pearl/diamond necklace, perfume, chocolate, two sarongs, sarong ties, silk scarf, coffee). The latter, gifts from his own long vacation to Hawaii. The former, carving time between working hours and sneaking to my town to make it happen. I have no idea what I did to get thousands in gifts this week. None, nope, nothing, have zero idea. 

Had to shave yesterday before work. Two weeks’ worth of leg and pubic hair. It had been so long since I’d been that hairy. Pre-dancing, I never really took the time to shave my legs in the winter (dude, it gets cold here) and didn’t have a solid reason to care about shaving my pussy (scizzor maintenance). I haven’t had that much hair since before I started dancing. It was an itchy, unsightly, silly luxury, but damnit, it was my luxury, all my own. I shaved it off and was rewarded with a supremely smooth pussy to spend hours playing with, if I hadn’t had to take my ass and it’s shaved hole to work. Instead, I worked.

Champagne and chocolate-covered strawberries from Lydia, for my birthday. The strawberries are quickly becoming my favorite indulgence. The champagne put me in a rather bubbly mood, but made my farts something horribly rank. I stealth-crop-dusted a group of men who came for a free show later in the night.

Under advisement from the new boyfriend, who knows his share about these things, I threw my elbow into the brachial nerves at the point of a shoulder while in VIP. I enjoyed his wince all the more, seeing my new self-defense skills work properly. Don’t touch the strippers’ pussies, fucker. Later, had a different guy of the same intention, and twisted his finger slightly, but not painfully, while giving him the most innocent voice and look and sweetly asked him not to make me break his fingers, because filling out incident reports takes forever. We don’t actually have incident reports, nor would anyone really care if I broke his finger/s (except, maybe, um, the Attempted Pussy Toucher). That was all it took. There’s probably something supremely fucking creepy about a naked woman using a child’s tone to nonchalantly tell you what happens when she breaks your fingers as though it is a minor, but regular, occurance in her day.

To my knowledge, I’ve never broken anyone else’s finger(s), intentionally or unintentionally, at the club, or otherwise.

I really had a great night last night. Average, money-wise, but I felt like dancing, and did just that, to the tune of very little stage cash and very little concern over it. Champagne-drunk. Happy to be running around in my dance shoes again.

Onward.

132.8 lbs this morning. Stuck my scale in the bathroom, in the way of everything. On. Off. On. Off. Comforting old habit. Days make sense that way. And make sense in blocks of food. 12pm. 3pm. 6pm. 9pm. The bigger numbers on the clock face. Tick. Tock. Numbers make sense. The numbers give me focus, something to do, something consistent. I miss my numbers. Columns. Clocks. Calculators. Scale. Counting. Packaging. Laboring over my numbers. Now the best I remember is any Social Security Number I run into. Talent!

Working again tonight.

Stripper badge earned, yeah.

And I need to learn how to thank someone for something that huge, ASAP. Any suggestions?