My Escort Blogging Crush

[bakersfield]

Maybe this is old news for people, but I cannot get enough of this blog:

http://nightmarebrunette.wordpress.com/

There's no way I'll ever meet her. There's more of a chance I'll walk on the moon someday. I have no idea what she looks like, but my guess, and this is me going way out on a limb here, is that she's a brunette. I sent her a long note once, trying to impress her by name-checking all the writers she reminded me of (Joy Williams, Lydia Davis), and I got back a 12 word reply. But I think I might love her.

Here's her latest post, if you're the kind of person who needs to be convinced to click:

Some keep them on. Some take them off. I wonder where the ring goes when it’s no longer on the hand, what places a man keeps it so it’s not lost or forgotten for a day or a full weekend or even a few hours. Many married men have hired me on their birthdays. Married or no, many enjoy talking about their sons, if they have them. They do not soon tire of describing how handsome and smart and accomplished he is. On occasion, the handsome part is true. If there are two sons, one will be the clear favorite.

“Show me a picture,” I said once, after listening for some time about this miracle of a boy.

“I’m not showing you a picture of my son,” he said.

I kept looking at him.

“Oh, alright,” he said, and reached for his phone.

Weeks before, I took some sniffs of something that hurt and for a time the night was wonderful. A man I’d known but not known for years met me in a bar, and then later we went to my hotel room and he laid his head in my lap while I stroked his hair in a trance on the bed. Later, after my girl friend left us, he asked if he could masturbate and he came quickly while I touched him. There may have been some unspoken pact that neither of us would write about it. Or maybe he forgot it even happened.

I am still capable of feeling used. I am still capable of having a sexual experience that makes me feel like my entire life has been a mean joke.

The date went pretty wrong with one father client, a man I’d seen several times before and remembered fondly. It started out so promising. “You’re a witch!” he cried early on in our reunion. He’d repeat it again now and then, ducking his head afterwards like a boy hiding from something that embarrasses him. It crumpled later and I wanted to blame him but it might have been all my fault. I felt like a statue with a human being buried inside. Everything was muffled: the sadness, the anger. I just tried to hold still.

Before I left, I stood in the Sunday light of his hotel room, holding the image of his son. “You wouldn’t stand a chance with him,” he said meanly, like that would hurt me.

[womanizer]

Looks like a rather profound rendering of the provider experience. I'm anxious to read more. I also like to read The Honest Courtesan.

[The Quiet Man]

It all seems terribly sad to me. Such negative emotions, such demeaning and belittling attitudes expressed by the clients. I hope I am never so bitter towards women that I would show that level of disrespect.

[bakersfield]

Wasn't it Melville who said, "truth uncompromisingly told will always have its ragged edges"? Some of her stuff is sad. Some of it is happy. She likes some of her clients and doesn't like others. But every word seems true and real and vital.

Here's an example of pure connection and joy from one of her pieces:

Once I fell asleep in the arms of man who had been delighting me. “This is all braggadocio,” he said, pausing in the middle of his lovable holding forth, “but you’re not stopping me.” When he talked about his childhood I asked if he ever had a pet crow. “Oh well everyone wants a pet crow!” he replied. He talked about tarantula hawks. He wore coke bottle glasses and described his style as “Larry David.” He called me conservative and brazen and sweetheart. When he were eating lunch, he looked at the broccoli on my plate and said “A cauliflower is a fractal. ” I reached across the table and put my hand on his. He had won me.

I slipped off while he was showing me pictures on his phone and came to at his words about a picnic. “A picnic!” I said as I awoke.

That's from http://nightmarebrunette.wordpress.c...all-practices/. After I read that, for days afterwards I would find myself remembering that final waking "A picnic!" exclamation, completely charmed. I once structured an entire review so I could end it with a line I stole from a Lynda Barry comic that had similarly struck me (the line was "I am here. I am ready."). I thought about trying to do the same with this ending, but I could never figure out how to do it. But that last paragraph seems absolutely perfect to me.