Art Sale

So the movie premieres tomorrow. My first as producer. I came here six long years ago like everyone else that comes here with Tinseltown dreams. Now in a scant few hours, I’ll see the first film with my name in the credits on the big screen. It’s a thrill, yes. But I find something else nags at me - has me hesitate about embracing complete glee and giddy success. It’s natural to be nervous at unveiling your art for the world but considering I didn’t write or direct it, it’s not like the artistic risk is mine so much. So why the reluctant heart?

I must have been six or seven. It was a lovely summer day and I loved to color. I left my pre-drawn coloring books behind and created thirty-odd original pieces on mom’s work stationery. They encompassed all the key subjects for a girl of my generation: flowers, unicorns, sail boats, family, and of course, the General Lee, both side and top views.

Very pleased with my output, I trotted across the street and scarfed white quartz rocks from the neighbors. I then colored a rock to match each masterpiece so that each had, in effect, a matching paperweight.

I’d always been praised for my creative ability so I thought I’d best share it. I laid the pictures all over my front lawn and pinned each in place with its lovely accompanying rock. I then scurried around my neighborhood (back when you’d let a six or seven-year old run around a neighborhood alone) and put up signs proudly emblazoned “ART SALE” followed by our address.

Then I sat on the lawn and waited for the art-thirsty public. I would help all their homes become cheerier places.

It was a weekday and there wasn’t that much foot traffic in our residential neighborhood but after a while a few neighbors happened by. They each duly selected a picture and paid their ten cents – I believed in an egalitarian pricing system. That was it for a while.

Finally a car whirred around the corner. The husband driving pulled over and stayed in the car. The saggy wife launched herself onto our yard.

“Excellent,” I thought, “I love enthusiastic customers.”

The woman’s face took in the proud display on the grass and quickly shifted from eagerness to confusion, confusion to disappointment and from there to rage. She turned her coal-lump eyes and jabbed a stubby finger at me.

“How dare you?” She seethed. I thought it was a trick question.

Before I could respond, she spat “this isn’t art. How dare you mislead people like that? You’re wasting their time with this crap! You horrible little brat.”

My jaw dropped as she turned on her heel and marched back to her car. I was pretty sure it wasn’t OK to speak to someone the way she’d spoken to me but there was no one around to tell her so.

“It is too art,” I finally squeaked as she slammed the car door and admonished the husband to speed away presumably to real art.

I stood there shocked for several long moments before I understood what I was really supposed to do. Quickly as I could, I sped through the neighborhood tearing down my shameful signs. I bundled them up with my stupid pictures and threw them, rocks and all, under our front bushes. Then I hid in my room. Sharing art was not safe.

Now I wish the adult me could be back there standing next to those same bushes to deliver a hard smack across that windbag’s slavering jowls. Who speaks to a child like that? I’m incredulous as I recall her all these years later, comical in her absurd agitation.

Now I am no longer the heart-on-sleeve child (or am I, also?). I am the woman with a right to creation, a freedom of expression, a passion for sharing my point of view. I’m sure there’ll be windbags. There always are. But this time I won’t hide our creation under a bush.

I imagine Windbag’s shock as she watches our intense opening sequence, her discomfort through the squeamish parts, her outrage at the surprise ending. As she storms out of the theatre I yell “It is too art, you foul beast, because I say it is.”

Then as she screams at her husband to gun it away from the curb, I launch several bright quartz rocks colored with flowers and unicorns at her back window. Several decades too late but it still feels good. Oops, that General Lee one may have left a dent.

My Big Break

As a feminist and advocate for human rights, I am generally against the objectification of women. When the call came in my first reaction was offence.

I’d forgotten I’d registered with Central Casting a few years back during one of those “my secret dream is to be a movie star” phases. With my work, I don’t have time to call in for available jobs I might be an ideal extra for. Nor could I take the time off work to go be on set anyway.

Then Angie from Central Casting called and asked if I could please make a meet and greet with a certain director. My blood boiled at his name, the Rat Bastard. He was one of those big time Hollywood schmucks whose name is synonymous with objectifying women both in his cadre of films and in his personal exploits which often enough grace Defamer and TMZ.

“You’re his first choice and he wants to meet you tomorrow,” Angie informed me. “He specifically needs really tall women.” Here she hesitated as if ashamed to speak the words: “The part is Amazon Prostitute.” Silence.

I mumbled unintelligible comments while I wrestled with my disgust, indignation, …and possible shot at stardom. “I’ll be there,” I told Angie.

The irony of this being my possible screen debut was not lost on me. That night I tore my closet apart. I needed something whorish but that I felt comfortable enough in that I’d stand and walk with confidence. I settled on my pushiest push-up bra, four-inch heels rendering me WMBA tall, and a low-cut wrap dress which, at last wearing, I’d been accused of throwing my boobs at a boy. That boy is now my boyfriend so I felt the dress worked. I tried everything on and saw the epitome of sexy, warrior goddess chick in my reflection. I’d win this part , get in with people who got things made in this town, and start to change the system from the top down. Yes!

The next day, cleavage and eyeliner in full force, I sashayed across the studio lot with an odd confidence. Men stared, women shot disapproving glares. “This isn’t really ME,” I wanted to confide to them. But at the same time, I enjoyed what felt like amazing power. I walked on, about to expose way more of myself than is strictly proper to a man I vilified for doing the same thing. I was about to seek his approval of merely my body and nothing more.

I was ushered into the casting room with the other four candidates where I babbled random facts about myself hoping to stand out from my Amazon sisters. The “my body and nothing more” part stuck in my craw. I needed him to know I am amazing in ways other than my décolletage and my thirty-six inch inseam. I felt awkward and silly. Not at all the proud, sex-queen that had stared back at me from the mirror earlier. I grinned at the Rat Bastard on his perch on a generous couch and was relieved I didn’t have to meet him in this room alone. We were ushered back out and told we’d be contacted later.

I changed into flip-flops, pulled by neckline higher and shuffled back to my car. I had been his first choice after all. I was sure he’d call.

He didn’t. I didn’t get the part of Amazon Prostitute and I was sad. I was amazed by the absurdity of it all. That he’d call me of all people for such a part. That I’d genuinely want to play it. And that me of all people wouldn’t get it. I’ll never really know why he didn’t choose me but I’m pretty sure I may have talked myself out of the job. I guess feminism and objectification don’t mix. Or maybe eye-candy and brains. At least not if you’re a Rat Bastard.

Enamored of an Ass

As a young writer, I identified most with Shakespeare’s romantic characters. Viola, Rosalind, Helena; the girls with pluck and moxie who had great adventures and won the handsome protagonist too. They fit with my world view of how my life would go. As I get older, I find instead, I resonate most often with Titania. Not just because she’s queen of the faeries. Of course any title helps. But because, after a too-long night lavishing her royal attention on the donkey-head-transformed Bottom the Weaver, the spell is broken and she comes to her senses, puzzled as to why on earth she would sink so low. Out of sorts, she murmurs to Oberon, her king, that “I dreamt I was enamored of an ass.”

I am not the best judge of character as last summer’s subletter debacle can attest along with countless questionable choices of boyfriends. With my Pollyanna heart in full force, I take people at face value too often buying into their knight-in-shining-armor acts until I wake up one day, rather embarrassed and a tad horrified wondering why the truth wasn’t so obvious before.

The funny artist who turned out to be a broken child, the suave producer who turned out to be a selfish and cruel lay-about, the regal cook who turned out to be an uptight asshole… Oh ‘Tania, I feel you.

It’s not just in love either. It’s friendships too. Early in film school, I became fast friends with a girl who was always up for life’s adventures. We soon agreed to carpool to campus. It actually took me months before I realized she had never once offered to drive and I was the one going twenty miles out of my way for her on a weekly basis with nary an offer of gas money. But desperate for a good girlfriend in my new Tinseltown life, I clung to her.

We excitedly planned a girls’ night out and when we walked into the bar of her choice, I recoiled. It was filled with frat boys and plastic piñatas. Not the classy, low-key wine bar I had in mind. “Isn’t this great?” she gushed. Wake up call! A mutual friend later told me that this girl had once imposed on friend to drive to another state to bail her out of jail. On the way home they made a highway fast-food pit stop and she hadn’t even offered to buy the girl’s Big Mac.

My lack of people radar extends to my business life as well. I once bought so completely into a new friend’s business consultant act I set my best friend up with her for a consultation. My friend had taken precious time off her day job to have a half-hour lunch with this woman and get key guidance for the business she was launching. Instead of being the grand business match up I had imagined, the woman kept my friend tangled up for a two hour “meeting” that was garbled by email, and text interruptions and other clients needing “just a minute of her time.” The woman was actually rude enough to field several phone calls while my friend sat there, watching the minutes tick by and imagining her boss’ face getting redder by the minute as she wondered how to explain her quadruple-time lunch absence to him. To top it off, the woman later emailed expecting payment for her pearls of wisdom which had never been part of the discussion. I was mortified that I put my friend in this position and that I had been foolish enough to think highly of the woman’s business skill in the first place.

It doesn’t stop there. I once brought another new friend into my business. Dazzled by his professional talents as well as his smile, I bought his act hook line and sinker. We all did. Well, most of us did. Several of the other guys at work grumbled about all the flash and dazzle but I put off their comments. I actually thought “I can’t be wrong again, surely.” Of course I can, and don’t call me Shirley.

I watched waitresses melt for him when we had our business meetings out and I felt twinges of jealousy as he returned their smiles. I didn’t have a personal interest in him, not in that way, but I still wanted to be the girl he was focused on. What can I say, I’m a Leo, I need the spotlight. I listened to him tell me things that in any dating scenario would have been huge red flags: past bad break ups, low opinions of women in various parts of his life, a tendency to use people. It’s OK, I thought, I’m not a girl in his life in that way. Whew.

One day, some part of his pedestal slipped. I saw his self-admitted user tendencies as draining and selfish rather than starving artist bohemian, his righteousness as insecurity rather than maturity, his unresponsiveness as flakey rather than mysterious. At a certain moment I watched him with a date and thought “thank god that’s not me.” At least he was good at his job.

Despite this relief, I found myself as angry with him as I have been with any ex, former friend or evil subletter. For weeks I stewed in my anger until my boyfriend, ever the wise one, pointed out that I was angry because I was embarrassed. I was embarrassed that I defended him to people who had seen more clearly than I, embarrassed that I had been fished in yet again by someone unworthy of my heart and my esteem. Donkey heads!

Unfolding from there, I finally saw clearly why I hadn’t been able to let go of other angers. It wasn’t that I hadn’t forgiven the exes for their assorted transgressions and cruelties. It was that I hadn’t forgiven myself for having chosen them in the first place.

That realization made waking up next to my real life Oberon all the sweeter. The irony is that for all these months as I reminded myself of these past judgment failures, I subjected him to a vetting of presidential proportions. Sure, he seemed like a fabulous boyfriend but I’m probably wrong again. Better poke and prod as much as I can to be sure.

He bore it all with grace and patience; far more than I deserved. The one person I have been the most suspicious of is the one person who didn’t merit my doubts. Figures I would turn the Spanish Inquisition on the wrong guy. I’m just lucky that he stuck around through it, waited till I washed the last of those faerie dust dreams away and laughed with me at the sight of all those donkey-headed former lovers, flushed friends and current folk.

Could it be? Could Pollyanna at long last be tempered by some real clarity and on-target intuition? Dare to dream.

Charity on the Sly

Anyone who knows me knows I am huge fan of KCRW. I’m a huge fan of public radio in general and look to KCRW as the taste maker for music. I need KCRW in my day. As far as I’m concerned there is no other radio worth listening to in LA. It’s either KCRW or my iPod.

I got my start in music snobbery early. I was perfectly willing to come to blows over musical taste and once pulled over and kicked a friend out of my car for slagging one of my favorite bands. For me, musical taste is not a matter of opinion, it’s a question of right and wrong.

I honed this attitude in college radio where I worked with several of KCRW’s current players and where I developed my CD collection. Back then I’d try to explain to the frat boys that if they listened to us, they could hear the next Chili Peppers or Cure or Nirvana before they became huge. They’d be on the cutting edge. They’d have none of it. Being on the edge was too much work for them. They just wanted to have their tastes formed neatly for them by KROQ. Here I proudly state I never dated a sheep-brain frat boy.

Luckily, my man shares my tastes for the most part or we’d have ended in tears long ago. He takes it one further. When flipping across the dial, if we catch a glimpse of generic pop pablum (read: every other corporate station now that Indie 103.1 is dead), he’ll quip “Ah yes, music for people who don’t like music.” His tartness on this topic steals my heart. But he’s got a great point. Because if you really thought about what you were hearing on corporate stations, if you delved into the artistry, you’d find none. If you really listen, you couldn’t possibly be satisfied by corporate crap. It’s music for people who don’t really listen but just need something to fill their ears. Like aural junk food.

Anyway, I love my indie music and my NPR. So every six months when KCRW conducts their on-air fund drive I always sign up for as many shifts as I can fit into my overtaxed schedule. Until the day I can afford an angel membership, I feel it’s the best way I can give back. Plus you meet the coolest people. Plus it gives me a teeny nostalgia flashback of my college radio days. So much joy.

The thing is because of my overtaxed schedule, because I have so many people depending on me to run our company, I don’t feel I can tell anyone that’s what I’m doing with my day. I’m not alone.

This time around I struck up a conversation with the project manager at the phone across from mine. She furtively slipped off a cell phone call. “That was my work. As far as they know, I’m at the doctor.” Like me she was over-scheduled, trying to be great at three jobs at once, occasionally sleep and have a social life. Like me, she felt that if the people that depend on her knew she was helping instead of working they’d be pissed.

What is that? We should be proud of our charity. Heck, our work should be proud of our philanthropic spirit, not to mention our good taste in radio. Yet somehow, we both felt like kids that might get caught playing hooky. What does that say about the priorities of giving in our culture?

“Must be nice,” quips a co-worker when I slip up and mention my first shift. He heads back to his to-do list while I am left stinging from the implication that I’m not working as hard as he is. Though I am his boss, I feel the need to justify my choices, to prove that the company is not at risk if I also live my life.

In our modern life, balance seems like indulgence. If you have time to balance your life, you are not working hard enough. This feels like not seeing the forest for the trees.

Last year I wrote about the wonder of discovering the weekend again. I vowed not to work on weekends. As predicted, I have back-slid somewhat on this. That constant need to prove I’m working hard enough is a demanding master. But my co-worker is right, albeit unintentionally: taking time to do what I need for me must be nice indeed.

So, you know what, working world? I took time from my work week to help out a cause I believe in.

As I say that I feel the panic rising; “say you still got more work done than they did,” it chirps. I’m tempted but no.

That’s the lesson. I may have in fact gotten less done than you did. And I’m OK with that because I did something that helps define my life. I am reaching for balance and doing something that I believe is an important contribution for the greater good.

I may not be able to give everyone good music taste, but I can do my part to ensure good music is accessible for those of us who know it when we hear it. And even for those sheep-brains should they ever choose to change their dials. I may be years from my beloved college radio but I’m still fighting the good fight. And keeping that spirit alive helps me do a better, fulfilled job running my company. Everybody wins.

p.s. your favorite band sucks.

Diablo Cody Frosts My Mitten

Last year, the Oscars were a bitter pill for me. I railed against the nomination and win of Diablo Cody and “Juno” for best screenplay. They say we writers are vicious bunch of haters when it comes to our fellow writers’ success. And, well, it’s true. But sometimes it’s also merited.

I had many issues with the film from a feminist perspective as well as the overall, gag-me cuteness factor. She was lauded for the quirkiness of her characters while I felt she shorthanded quirkiness with an unusual phone and other props. Isn’t real character more than props?

“Oooooh, look how funky her kids talk! How natural. She captured the 16 year old,” people said. Um, no, that’s a 35 year old putting the quirk and construction of 35 year old speak into the mouth of a 16 year old. I was a damn funky 16 year old and I didn’t speak like that. I speak like that now.

Even more annoying was her hipper-than-thou musical references. That’s my gig. I wrote a screenplay four years ago featuring a character who wore a “your favorite band sucks” t-shirt and bring my years of bona-fide college radio DJ experience to everything I write.

People were amazed that Diablo “discovered” the Moldy Peaches. “New indie rock darlings” the heralds blasted. Thank the gods Diablo, our hipness prophet, delivered them unto us. I hated the Peaches eight years ago when I saw them play a little club in Denver. They sucked then and they still suck.

My ire spun out of control.

“But she’s a woman. And she won,” my producing partner gently reminded me. It’s a well-worn fact that as women in the industry we are fighting an uphill battle with a miniscule percentage of films directed or written by women, let alone nominated. She had a point. I felt a pang of guilt about not supporting our sister.

Then I got it. My script with the “your favorite band sucks” t-shirt. The random game my friends and I used to play defining our quirkiness by who could come up with the best non-sequitor. Breaking the best indie bands. The thrill of writing the little script that could… I was pissed because Diablo Cody stole my shtick. And she won a freakin’ Oscar for it. So now, what were the odds my quirky girl script could win anything? Or even be made?

All my issues with the Juno script aside, I was really insanely jealous. Which I guess is a form of flattery – if somewhat twisted. I finally saw Diablo with kindness and solidarity.

This year I missed her up there on the stage bereft of female nominees, not to mention wins. I don’t dig her style per se but I hope she’s up there again next year along with every other woman making upward progress in Hollywood.

If begrudging another’s success initiated me into real writer-hood, all that remains is the other part of the initiation: actually having one of my scripts sold and made.

Hello, Hollywood? It’s ready. It’s quirky. Call me. Love you. Mean it.

The Note Writer

I am that neighbor.

I have stuck my head out the window at 3am and shouted for quiet. Those darn kids. I have left notes in their mailboxes when they woke up the whole street for weeks on end. I have left notes on cars sticking into my driveway or otherwise inconsiderately parked.

I have considered leaving notes for people with selfish signs:

“Don’t even think of parking here” – It’s a public street. You don’t have the right to restrict parking.

“If caught disposing of trash in this bin, you will be prosecuted” – If you spend your energy on something as trivial as guarding your trash cans you must have a sad life.

“Yes on Prop 8” – You are a hateful bigot…but then we’ve already been over that one.

I have also considered leaving notes for other concerning behaviors: The whole street can hear you when you scream at your elderly mother. We wonder if we should report elder abuse.

Sometimes I just feel the need to blow off the steam of my occasional outrage at the state of the Universe. Notes are fairly harmless. Plus every thwarted screenwriter needs as many outlets as she can get.

The thing is I also am the neighbor everyone likes, the one you can count on, the one you invite over for tea and cookies. I don’t know if they’d be so quick with the Toll House if they knew I was the righteous note bitch. I like to keep my righteous note soap-boxing anonymous. I feel my noted opinions are indubitably correct but I still don’t want anyone to know it’s me – just in case they’re not.

I was having tea and cookies last night at a neighbor’s when a friend of theirs popped in for a cuppa. He said he was parked in the alley with his hazards on. I suggested he park in my driveway and he chuckled. Then our hosts chuckled.

“What?” I asked.

“Tell her,” one prompted.

“Well,” hedged the guest, “it’s just kind of funny that you would offer since you once left that note on my car.”

I froze, horrified. How did they know? “What note?”

“I guess I didn’t realize four cars can fit across the street and I had sort of parked in the middle of the space so only three –“

“It said ‘please be a considerate neighbor,’” interrupted our host, “’four cars park here.’” She giggled. The guest giggled. Everyone giggled but me.

I actually remembered coming home expecting to park in front of my house but being thwarted by a rogue car who, very rudely in my estimation, took up more than his share of curb so that I couldn’t. I was pissed. Indignant. I wrote a note and smacked it on the windshield. If there was one thing I couldn’t stand it was people who were oblivious to how their actions affected others. I remembered writing that note; being that righteous bitch.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I waffled. “I didn’t leave a note.”

My hosts chuckled on. It was clearly no big deal. But I was on a roll.

“Why do you think it was me?”

“You said you left notes.”

“Yeah, for the loud kids. They woke us all up for a month, remember? But… never just on a car.” I dug deeper.

“Oh. Huh.” The chuckling was dying out now.

“I’m actually kind of offended that you would think it was me.” Dang this was a big shovel.

“Oh don’t be offended. It was just funny.”

The evening went on from there and we moved on but I kept thinking about it. I wasn’t actually offended, of course. I just hadn’t known what else to say. It probably would have been much better for me to admit to the note and laugh along with them since it was clearly no biggie to them. But something stopped me. I didn’t want them to think I was an awful note-leaver.

I had always kept my notes anonymous because I was afraid, not of being wrong, but of being thought of as the bitchy busy-body with nothing better to do but leave notes on cars, passing judgment on others’ actions from on high. I didn’t think anyone would invite a note writer over for tea and cookies. Not being part of their neighbor family was what I was afraid of.

Yet they had laughed. They didn’t care if I was a quirky, occasionally indignant note writer. They knew and had accepted me for me anyway. Even then, I was afraid to trust them with my silly truth.

As I walked home, warm with tea. I though how silly I had been to lie. It’s not like the secret identity I was protecting was like Superman or anything. I was just the Note Writer. I will set the record straight over tea tonight. I finally get it. Friends accept you, opinions and all, and don’t cast judgment even if one’s opinion delivery method is a tad ridiculous. I’ll have to write them a thank you note.

Travels with Dad

One of the things I am most fortunate to have in my life is a father who believes that travel is the best education. After my parents divorce I began by traveling out to visit him. I felt very worldly and grown-up on the plane by myself at five. The flight attendant would hand me a plastic wings pin which I would wear proudly on my cardigan. That was in the days where loved ones could still meet you at the gate and when we landed she’d walk me out to my dad expectantly standing in the boarding area.

Over the years, dad and I have been all over the world together; Europe several times, Africa. It’s our tradition to spend Thanksgiving in Mexico. As a teen, I’d swear after each trip that I’d never travel with him again. He’d do such mortifying things as point sights out to me on tours or talk too loud in museums. But of course there’d always be another trip.

As I’ve become an adult, the mortification has taken on a new flavor. Anyone who looks at us for more than five minutes can see the resemblance between us. I have my dad’s nose, his lanky, athletic frame, the overall shape of his face. Yet as my laugh lines have increased, it’s no longer obvious that we are parent/child. More often than not, people assume we’re a couple. I see the knowing looks when I emphasize to the hotel clerk we need a room with two beds.

I don’t know why I give such a crap about what strangers think but I do and this assumption offends me to no end. God, no! I want to shout. I’m not the kind of woman that would be some old guy’s trophy wife! There’s a thirty-five year difference between us, get your mind out of the gutter. Are you blind? Can’t you see we look alike?!

To combat these tawdry assumptions, I very maturely make a point of slipping into any conversation that might arise that we are in fact father/daughter. If there’s no conversation, I’ll loudly call him ‘dad’ for those casual listeners on the pool deck, or tour bus or whatever.

This year’s trip to Mexico was no different. We met another vacationing family with a hen-pecked husband and brittle wife. After talking with them for more than half an hour, I went to change for dinner. The disapproving wife leaned over to my father and asked, “come on, is that really your daughter?” When dad reported this to me over dinner I was doubly offended. Not only was she assuming me to be “one of those women” but even after our familial conversation, she was basically calling me a liar.

I have to wonder why it is so unfathomable to people that a father and daughter would travel together. We saw a mother/daughter pair at our hotel around our same ages and I’m pretty sure no one assumed they were a May/December lesbian couple. Is it only with the full compliment of family members that such travel becomes acceptable? If my dad had a wife would it be OK? If I had a husband? Kids? Whatever the case, it’s certain we remain an oddity…and people’s minds are in the gutter.

It drives me nuts but maybe it’s not the worst thing. Over the course of our week in Mexico, we became friendly with our waiter, Jesus, at our hotel restaurant. One night, apparently feeling he was on more personal terms with us, Jesus asked “so are you two honeymooners?” Et tu, Jesus? I was mortified yet again. We were standing at the hotel restaurant entrance and I could feel the room lean closer to hear the sordid details of the silver fox and his young missy. Here, I thought, is my opportunity to set everyone straight. Years of pent-up witty quips massed at my fingertips.

“No, this is my dad!” I blurted.

Now poor Jesus was mortified. He apologized repeatedly for having offended us while my dad assured him it was fine. The ears in the restaurant shifted away and dad and I went for our evening walk.

Somewhere in the course of the night, Jesus decided that if I was traveling with my father, I must therefore be single and available. The next day at breakfast, he greeted us enthusiastically and I figured at last I could relax in the comfort of knowing our fellow hotel dwellers at last knew the truth.

Then Jesus told us the story of his night. He had returned to the hotel around two in the morning but security wouldn’t let him in. He had been determined to give me a red rose and apparently had made quite a scene including trying to scale a wall to get past security. He didn’t notice our creeping unease as he recounted his ardent love.

“Please, Senor,” he put his suit to my dad. “I must be allowed to give this rose to your daughter or I will die. May I have your permission? What is your room number?”

Dad fudged, asked for the check. “We’ll see you in a bit.”

“OK,” Jesus mooned after me. “Be careful, baby.” He said in a tone dripping with possessiveness and drama.

Dad and I hightailed it out of the restaurant. That was the last meal we ate at the hotel.

So maybe being assumed to be the trophy wife isn’t such a bad thing even if it turns my feminist stomach. Perhaps cheap misconceptions are worth not being courted by an off-balance stalker. Either way, travels with dad continue to be one of the more unusual adventures of my life. And, as dad has always believed, travel is an amazing education – in the oddities human behavior more than anything.