Performative Text Messages

When I was seventeen years old, I watched my grandmother pull apart two-ply Kleenex on her death bed. She would rip each half into four tiny squares, using each section to blow her nose. Though she was dying of pneumonia, not a fiber of tissue was to be wasted. As I watched her, I had the clear thought that somebody had to tell the story of these tiny pieces of Kleenex. Otherwise what was the point?

I feel the same way about pouring my heart into a riveting and inspired correspondence with the Married Man, a.k.a. the Elusive and Illicit Texting boyfriend. Without publishing my efforts on the Internet, what was the point?

Don’t worry, Married Man. I won’t give you away. Your side of the correspondence stays safe with me. I am the Queen of Confidentiality.

And anyways, I’m saving my Memoirs of a Brief Affair for a different day in June. Today I am way too busy.

One of the most important things about having a boyfriend is he is there to reassure you that the welt and/or welts on your groin are not herpes or cancer. Just like the doctor said all seventeen times you waited and paced around the ER or walk-in clinic waiting room.  Someday I plan to conquer and master Friction, Exfoliation and Pubic Hair Removal. That day was not last Friday.

Poor The Boatman. He had to stand in for the Married Man as the recipient of my Performative Text Messages. Just like the Married Man and just about everyone in the world, he is not as good a correspondent as me.

Performative Text Messages

Erica, Friday, 12:56 PM:

I am going to quit masturbating for one week to see if the problem with my sex drive is the Prozac or overthinking linked to typical erectile dysfunction.

No one writes back. I have a hard time focusing. It seems I need three coffees and one nap every day.

I bought several moisturizing and exfoliating products for the bumps on my crotch. I thought that was a nice sentence.

Erica, Saturday 8:39 AM

Two groin bump photos. (Should I post these photos on the Internet? Such choices are always a toss-up.)

I am concerned about my groin welt. It hurts. It is hard underneath. No pus. (Pus is a surprisingly difficult word to spell.)

No tingles.

Yesterday I googled sarcoma.

Erica, Saturday 9:01 AM

I am feeling ignored. And I’m worried I have cancer.

Erica, Saturday 9:39 AM

My phD friend does not think it is cancer or herpes. I showed him the photos this morning at Olimpico.

Erica, Saturday 11:29 AM

What are you doing? The thing about iPhones is that you can tell when people read your texts. If you are too busy, you can copy and paste the following. “There, there. Head pat. I’m sorry you’re having a hard day. It doesn’t look like herpes to me and I don’t think you have cancer. I’m busy doing blank but I hope we can talk soon. Maybe you can have a nice performative cry in a bus shelter.”

Erica has a nice performative cry in the bus shelter on the corner of Bernard and Clark.

The Boatman, Saturday 2:55 PM

Hi Erica. Yes sorry, I was a bit occupied. (Dot, dot, dot: Erica omits something personal.) I’m not always up for immediate text reply. I find my phone takes a lot of energy out of me these days. Sometimes I’ll read a text but get sidetracked and then respond later. It doesn’t mean I don’t care about you. I do, very much! Good luck on your break from masturbation. It’s good to take breaks from things I think. I’m sure your welt is just fine. Did you get it from humping the bed too much? I’m off to trim the hedge and mow the lawn. I’m not happy about it.

Erica, Saturday, 2:59 PM

Okay thanks. I’m sorry about (dot dot dot) and that you have to do yard work. I am quite good at yard work and would have been happy to help you with it. I already failed at the masturbation break. I might go to a clinic tomorrow just in case but I am probably fine.

The Boatman, 3:07 PM

Sounds like a good plan. Thanks for the spiritual help with the yard work. I’ll send your crotch spiritual health through the ether.

End of Performative Text Messages.

My gift for yard worked emerged in the Performative Self-Love Letters. Once the Boatman took a photo of me holding the hedge clippers close to my crotch. The hedge is tall, the hedge clippers are orange, and I look so happy.

Yard work is one of my greatest gifts.

The End.

Post-Script: Performative Exfoliation with the Magic Eraser.

I do not recommend this, though recently one of my coolest friends gave it a go. She reported excellent and effective exfoliating properties.

“But it’s carcinogenic,” I said.
“How do you know?”
“It has to be. It’s Mr. Clean. And a graphic designer from Halifax who isn’t the Boatman told me.”

One of my coolest friends wondered if maybe the generic Magic Eraser brand was un-carcinogenic. I doubted it, and still do.

Mr. Clean Magic. Discover all the Cleaning Possibilities!

Post-Script Two
Groin Welt Update: Omitted until further notice.
Welcome to June’s exfoliating and explosive transformative creativity.
Transformative and Performative.
If you don’t know what performative is, ask.

Exuberant Bodhisattva on Facebook
Twitter: @mypelvicfloor
I Let Go, by Erica J. Schmidt ($2.99)

Kleenex
Performative Crying in Alleys
Why I am Like Jane Fonda
Dear Internet, Please be my boyfriend for five minutes.

The Budgie Exodus of Mile End

The day was quite performative.
But there’s lots of other news. For example, the Mile End is experiencing a Budgie Exodus.

On a poster on a telephone pole:

Perdu slash Lost. A little lovely blue-breasted budgie named Cloud. Her white wings are speckled with black. Have you seen her? Are all budgies named Cloud? My sister had a budgie named Cloud when I was in grade three and she was in grade six. As a child, I was somewhat afraid of birds. I’d cover my head whenever they were let out of their cages, terrified they’d poop on me. Or worse, that they’d stick their weird feet on my shoulders. Birds have very odd feet. Birds, hamsters, possibly ferrets. The Weird Feet Club. You have weird feet too. (Just then, I was talking to myself.)

Anyways, the night before Remembrance Day in grade three, my sister’s budgie Cloud had taken rather ill. Sticky feathers, diarrhea. Whatever happens to sick budgies, Cloud had all of it. One of the worst things about having pets is having to put them down when they are dying. Totally devastating. I guess that’s the good thing about birds, hamsters and other odd-footed creatures. They usually die on their own.

My sister did not want her beloved bird to die and so she and my mother joined voices and sang to the ailing Cloud. Their song choice was a great big tear jerker. Edelweiss, from the Sound of Music. Perfect for a dying white budgie.

“Small and white,

Clean and bright,
You look happy to meet me.”

I lay in bed and listened to them for what felt like hours. Despite their efforts, in the morning, Cloud was dead. More weeping by Mother and Sister. I was rather neutral about the whole thing. I took up weeping later in life. Grade five or six or seven.

We decided to bury Cloud in a shoe box in our backyard. I generously offered my multi-coloured parrot puppet to put in the box and keep Cloud company. The parrot puppet did not have feet. Cloud’s funeral involved more mourning renditions of Edelweiss.

“Blossom of snow may you bloom and grow.
Bloom and grown forever.”

And there in a shoebox in the ground behind our house on Mary Street, Cloud rested in peace.  

Twenty-three years later, similar budgies face similarly life-threatening perils. Cloud the Budgie is lost. Her picture is all over the cool streets of my cool neighbourhood. A couple afternoons ago, I bought a whole bunch of carrots at the Fruiterie de Mile End. The carrots were organic. On the way home, I ate them right out of the bag. As I walked down Bernard Street, I saw a poster written in a thick black marker, perhaps a Sharpie.

DID YOU
LOSE

YOUR
BUDGIE
CALL               
A phone number of someone who sadly got stuck in the 438’s.

I got catchy new Montreal digits on Monday. Got in with the 514's. Besides trying to reunite Cloud with her owner, it was the day's greatest accomplishment.

A chance to save the day. What a thrill! I went to the next nearest telephone pole to find Cloud’s poster. Shockingly, all of the slips with the telephone number had already been taken. How had seven people found Cloud already? So much for being a hero today.

 

Then on Monday, I came across Cloud’s poster on another telephone pole. This one still had a couple of slips with the owner’s phone number on them. I texted her my picture of the DID YOU LOSE YOUR BUDGIE POSTER.

 

Cloud’s owner texted back that alas, the ad was not for her budgie. She fears Cloud is long gone by now. But she very kindly offered to foster the found budgie.

 

“there are a lot of escaped pet birds flying around montreal this year,” Cloud’s owner texted. “it’s mind boggling!” She asked me to let her know “if anyone tells you they lost their green/yellow budgie (she’s not tame though so I doubt that’ll be the case, she’s definitely been neglected).

 

Friends and Fans of Mile End and Beyond: keep your ears open for the green and yellow budgie’s owner, keep your eyes open for Cloud, and if you have a bird of your own, keep your windows closed.

The End.

A lovely lady lent me her sunglasses at Olimpico
The Exuberant Bodhisattva
Twitter: @mypelvicfloor

All the Lonely People, Rainbows, the Big Black Dog and Sex
Performative Crying in Alleys
Obituary: Eliot, the Big Black Dog