Here's one of the zillions of reasons why this city is so great:
Whereas New York is an absolute mecca for fashion and beauty and all things "Lookin gooooooood!"-related, there are just a few times of year when all of that absolutely goes out the window. Because it has to.
A) The Stupid Rainy Season.
I'm walking everywhere--I need galoshes, I need an obnoxiously large umbrella, and, at some point, I know that I am going to be caught off-guard without these things and looking like a drowned rat. ...Why even try to look cute? I'm not. I won't.
B) The Snowy/Hell Freezeth Over Season.
I am woolen, I am layered, I am Jack's Brooklynite Yetti--and it's fine. I'm not freezing. ...I may look frumpy and glo-worm-like, but I'm not freezing.
-AND (lastly)-
C) ...The Season of the Infamous Oppressive HeatWave.
...
Now:
This one is arguably the funniest to me. The best and the funniest. Why? Because absolutely everyone gives up. EVERYone. It matters not who you are, where you're going, what you did--this almost became a Backstreet Boys-song, I'm sorry--you have stopped trying. (...Too much, anyway.) And why?
To do otherwise takes too much effort--effort which may, in fact, be futile.
Why put on a cute dress if you're just gonna sweat your way through in it minutes?
Why bother to do your hair if it's just gonna end up frizzing itself out into a three-foot-wide monstrosity the moment you leave your apartment?
Why wear heels or jewelry or glasses or underwear or life if...if...it just sucks and it's too hot to bother to strap it all on?!
Answer: don't. Don't do any of it.
I have no idea exactly what it is about being in a city that's typically so caught up in its own "image" and just seeing it kind of let go of itself and get lazy that's so hilarious and kind of (very) liberating to me--but it is. It totally is.
Examples (...of the week...from personal experience...):
*My gym became a ghost town overnight. My little typically flooded gym smack in the middle of NoHo--absolutely no one is there, all week--except for me (which might mean that I'm crazy...)...
*In one day--four-and-a-half hours, actually--I pass by three different drag queens at random in entirely different spots of the city. Not a one of them was wearing an ounce of make-up.
*Audition #1: Equity-audition, and everyone is dressed down and in billowy loose things and flip flops. Girls are casting sideways "Ew"-glances at my heels. My heels. (...Fuck em.)
*Audition #2: On-camera audition, and everyone is dressed even more down...and taking turns sticking paper towels up their shirts in the lobby.
"Does this shirt look wet to you?"
"...Um...you know, kinda..."
"You know what, I don't even care. I don't even care."
*There are lines outside of Tasti-Dee...for breakfast.
*"What'd you do last night?"
"Nothing."
"I didn't leave my bedroom. I couldn't."
"Me neither. It's the only room with an AC-unit."
"Same."
"I spent the night at my friend's house."
"Fun!"
"Because he has central air."
"....Ohhh. ...Have fun?"
"We just sat. And drank...water."
"Hmph."
*My motor skills leave me entirely and I develop the astonishing skill of dropping things directly into my non-existent cleavage...and finding that they stick there...and I don't find myself rushing to do too much about it.
*Everyone. And everyTHING. Is late. The trains, audition times, reservations...delivery guys...my realization that I haven't been drinking any water...which is why I can't sit up straight and feel like yacking...
*"Want a fudgsicle?"
"It's just too far away." (...It's in the next room...).
*Hey.
"Hey. ...Roomie."
How was your...day?
"Um.... I think...good...".
Good.
"...Yours?"
...Ohmygodidontthinki even remember. Really."
"Mmhmm."
...
...Are you just really stupid tired? I am like. So tired."
"Yeaaaaaah, I think I might like. Go to bed."
Me too.
"...Dude, we're the lamest. It's 8:30."
I can't--I mean...I know...
*The number of bra-less and bathing-suit-top-as-bra-women in the city have increased...dramatically.
*"The freezer and the low-boy are both broken. We have no ice cream, we have no unspoiled milk and the juice smells like death."
Oh no.
"Nothing for anyone. Like, maybe just...alcohol?"
Hmph.
"Yeah. ...Should we, like, fix it?"
...
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"
*... ... ....."Dude. It's been 15 minutes. We have not moved or spoken."
I know.
"We seriously should just go to bed. This is heinous."
I just--it's so far...
Slugs.
We become a society of slugs. All worker bees and show ponies alike.
It's as if we're handed this entirely different kind of universal struggle--and goddammit, I find it glorious and hilarious and so entirely unglamorous...that that only makes it greater.
I LOVE this shit!
And, ahmunna say this:
We're allowed to say that it's hot. We are. Because it is. Maybe don't look at it as if we're saying "I'm so much hotter than YOU are." (dear folks on Facebook who have had such a problem with anyone publicly complaining about the heat...I mean really...). Maybe, for once, we can accept that everyone's just trying to say:
"Holy fuckballs. It's hot. I am so hot--AREN'T YOU?!"
"ISN'T EVERYONE?!"
"...Want a blotting paper? You can have mine, because I...I don't even care. I just don't care anymore."
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