Make Me Shiny

It's going to be a light month for posting. For a number of reasons. Easiest--busy. More complex--the difficulty in writing about what is happening inside my head right now.

That said, New Year's (remember that?) was an appropriately unexpected and varied experience for me. I ended up out with my cousin, her boyfriend, his friend who works for Lockheed Martin, and her actor friend that she grew up with who is right now in King Lear at the Folger. It was a random group, and actor-friend and I resolved at the start not to talk theater all night since we can do that pretty much any time, and this was a chance to hang out with a whole bunch of world-development and economics types which, when you talk about theater all day, actually seems pretty fascinating.

We almost succeeded. At Party #1--the stylish-well-fed-dinner party--we chatted about the mutual friends we have (so much less than six degrees in the theater) and then I picked his brain a bit about the show until we had an almost heated discussion about Shakespeare and non-traditional casting. We then broke away and met other people, including a fellow from Gdansk, Poland. With him I babbled on about Stutthof--the concentration camp located outside of Gdansk.

Let it be decreed! If nothing else, Citymouse knows how to pump up a party! Avert the conversation to charged racial issues and concentration camps!

Yeah. Ummm. right.

We headed onward about thirty minutes to midnight, and I am sorry to say celebrated the official dawning of 2007 somewhere en route between parties. So be it.

At Party #2--the rockin' well-produced big-crowd party--we were regaled with large inflatable decorations and a projector with images celebrating the year that was had by the host and his friends. I'll admit, I was pretty beat by this time, and not the most exciting of guests. I guess I was past mixing at this point. Lame, Citymouse, lame.

Mixing is so 2006.

I called my parents, wished them well, and when I rejoined the party I ended up in our little circle next to Lockheed Martin friend. I think at this point I'd dropped all pretense of not talking theater as I recall that I was now raving about the rise of Sarah Ruhl, which I can only trace to the fact that my cousin and a friend who'd joined us by now both graduated from Brown. Somewhere in this discussion I noticed that L-M friend had his arm around me.

"That's weird." I thought. "Maybe he is having trouble standing up."

I inched a little to the side, but if he was indeed about to fall over it seemed cruel to leave him completely to his balance challenged state.

Then he started rubbing my back. Rub, rub. Rub, rub.

Ummm, excuse me?

It wasn't exactly a come-on, though I can only imagine that was what he intended. Rub, rub. Rub, rub. It reminded me of when I was little and I was sick and my mom would rub my back in concentric circles because somehow that made everything better. Rub, rub. Rub, rub.

Was he hoping that a genie would come out of my ear?

The thing is, I couldn't really step away because the party was too crowded. I couldn't tell him off because I wasn't up for starting a scene and it honestly didn't seem worth it. There was no way to subtly extricate myself from the sort-of-creepy-back-rub that was to ring in my 2007.

We departed soon, much to the relief of my tired head and well-stroked back, and I begged off requests to stay out and get another drink somewhere. Sweet Brown friend offered me and actor-friend a ride home and as soon as we got out of earshot both were like, "Man, what was up with the back rubbing?"

Glad to know my ick factor is well calibrated to the masses.

Happy New Year all.