Stop Being a Pussy

I had to go to The Spawn of Satan's Emporium yesterday.  O.K.  I didn't have to.  But I was looking for some wardrobe things.  I have had a few days off and, and I seem to be regaining a sort of vigor that has been lacking in me for about two years.  I think I am emerging from a long, functional depression.  So I am beginning to engage some of the chores that need to be done.  Like start the Jeep that is rotting in the front yard with a sticker on the windshield put there by the city.  Like graveling the driveways and re-sodding the yards and replacing the big ligustrum that were wiped out recently and tragically by a fungus in the soil.  I may even redecorate inside the house. Along with all of this, I've decided to do what I had always intended to do and change sets in the studio, at least from time to time.  I was lying in bed one morning, my body aching, my belly fat hanging, and I thought, "I'm too young to be this old."  I've been working on it ever since.

So.  I needed some things.  I went to Target first to look for lingerie.  I've done this before, but it was always after work on a weekday and there were not many people around.  Saturdays, though, seem to be another thing.  I approached a lady's underwear section full of women, mothers, daughters.  What the hell, I thought, but as soon as I picked up a pair of panties, I could feel the blood rush to my neck.  Just then, I felt the phone buzz in my pocket.  It was a text from Red.

"I'm in the lingerie section at Target.  I think the police will come," I wrote her.

I couldn't find anything I wanted, a black camisole top, standard white cotton underwear.  Eventually I did, but they were all sized six and up.  Most of the women I shoot with are size 0.  Had all the small sizes been picked already, or is the average woman who shops at Target much bigger?

"I can't find anything here," I texted again.  "I'm going to the children's section.  Wish me luck."

"You won't need luck," she wrote back.  "You'll need a lawyer."

She was right, of course.  Before I could look at anything, I got flustered by the look in a twelve year old's eye.  Glancing around to see if I was being followed, I made quick for the checkout counter with the two pairs of women's white cotton panties.

"These aren't for me," I said to the fat hispanic lady who was checking me out.  She didn't even smile.

My next stop was Party City, the only costume store in town.  I needed a new mask.  You would think it would be easy to find such a simple mask, but it isn't.  At least it hasn't been for me.  And once again, Party City had masks, but nothing like I needed.

"I can't find any masks," I texted Red.

"Go to one of the adult stores," she said.  "They have all sorts of things like that."

"Sure," I texted back.  "You want me to pick up anything for you?"

And that's how I ended up at The Spawn of Satan.  It is a big Adult Factory Outlet store that runs ads all the time on late night television.  They play cute little jingles and show happy couples smiling and laughing as the hold up "fantasy" costumes.  I don't know why it bothers, me, really. . . but it does. I know. . . hypocrite.  But I'm not.  I just have some confusion, that's all.  I'm conflicted.  A battle rages within.

The Spawn is in a bad part of town, and I was enjoying the view.  I passed the remains of an old 1950's hotel that still had the original sign, though in bad repair, standing out on the highway.  I would come and make some pictures of that, I thought as I drove by.  All about were the skeletons of a time gone.  The road was perpetually torn up for repair, orange cones and blockades making traffic veer this way and that.  People stood in line at an old Dairy Queen that still served ice cream but was now called something else.  The people looked poor and miserable.  Everything including the people was in shambles.  This is what I should be photographing, I thought for the millionth time.  Here's life's story.  It's been chronicled to death, I know, but it needs a new chronicler. . . and I'm just the man for the job.  Really.  I will come back, I thought.  I will bring the Liberator.  It will cause the adrenaline to flow.  It will take a lot of time and effort.

But not just now.  And of course, that's the way it always goes.  Nope.  I was on another mission.  And there it was, a big billboard atop the building announcing it:  The Spawn of Satan Adult Factory Outlet.

Sure, I'm lying about the name, but that is what I felt pulling into the parking lot.  Jesus, I thought.  What if somebody sees me walking in?

The inside was brightly lit like a new care showroom.  There was no hiding here.  I texted Red.

"I'm here.  Holy shit!  I have to pee but I'm afraid to go to the bathroom."

"Stop being a pussy," she said.

"Oh. . . O.K.  Remember that later.  I'm going to get you a BIG surprise."

"WTF?"

"Like you said. . . don't be a pussy."

I walked over to the costume section.  It seemed the safest place to be.  Who buys this stuff, I wondered, thinking guiltily about the "Lonesomeville" series.  But this stuff was inauthentic, cheap, sleazy.  Ho-ho-ho, I heard some invisible critic chuckle.

Masks.  I was looking for masks.  The dizziness was starting to clear a bit.  My vision seemed to be returning.  I was coming out of the tunnel.  Here and there scattered about the crotchless panties and cat o' nine tails were leather masks without eye holes.  WTF? indeed.  There was nothing of any use to me here.

I began to notice the other people in the store.  There were single men and a few couples.  I'm guessing that women don't come into these places alone (but I'm sure I'll be advised on this later).  I decided to look around since I was already here, already video recorded.  I walked over to a section that required batteries.  There were vibrating things and twirling things and things that went up and down and in and out.  Another section housed objects for penetrating any orifice you might have.  Next to that, there were stimulants and lubricants and pumps for both men and women.  I saw a fellow older than I looking at the penis pumps and wondered to myself what he was thinking.  Really?  Does he believe those things work?  Do they?  I don't know.  It was all too much for me to imagine.

By now a store employee was following me.  I think.  She turned up on every aisle I was on.  I looked at her.  She offered no help.  Didn't even smile.  I guessed it was time for me to go.

It was mid-afternoon by the time I pulled back out on the highway.  I'd spent the better part of the day on a fruitless search.  Worse.  I felt grateful, though, that things had gone as well as they did.  No public officials had become any way involved.

Driving back by the old hotel with the sign, I decided to stop.  There was a vacant lot next to it with a curb cut leading nowhere.  I parked in the grass on top of the piles of litter there, grabbed my Leica, and got out.  Grainy black and white.  Maybe it would look good.  Nevertheless, it was the only camera I had with me.

After walking around and snapping a couple frames, I noticed the few cars parked in front of some of the terribly rundown rooms.  I wondered who lived there, what their circumstances were, and why.  These were the stories, real ones, dangerous ones I assumed.  I used to know people with lives such as these who lived in bad places.  But not as bad as this.  There were some horrible addictions in there.

I was beginning to walk away when a man came quickly toward me from the front office.

"What are you doing, he queried?  He was a dark Indian man with a deeply lined face.  He was missing his top two front teeth.

"Hey there," I smiled.  "I'm just taking a picture of the sign.  It is great.  There isn't much of this left.  My childhood was filled with things like this.  This place must have been built in the '50s."

He was smiling a bit now.

"Yes, the fifties," he said.

"Well, it is great.  No worries man, I'm just a photographer and wanted to make some pictures of that."

"Oh, O.K." he said and we waved to one another as I hurried back to the car.  But as soon as I was inside, I knew I'd blown it.  I should have asked him questions, I thought.  I should have gotten the story.  I'm out of practice.  I was trying to get out when I should have been trying to get in. Red was right, of course, but about the wrong thing.  I was being a pussy.

As I say, I'm feeling good again.  Maybe not good yet, but better.  Depression makes the body hurt, I think, makes it old.  And all the self-medication doesn't help, either.  I am feeling more mobile again, though.  I feel like moving.  Motion.  Getting away.  Leaving the old fears and sadness behind.  I'll work on new sets in the studio.  But I keep thinking.  I must go back and talk to that man at the hotel.  I'll go with one of my other cameras and walk into the office to tell him I'm there and want to shoot in color.  I'll ask him questions.  There will be stories.  It will be something.