in issue nine: humor
Scintillations
Hair Dye Hell
Morning Glory
Made With Extra Love
My
Father's Legacy
It's A Gift
Toe Job
Need
A Laugh?
Cleaning Day
Letters to
My
Younger Self
Moody Girl
photography
Beach
Foot
Leaf
Gnome
Picnic
Tables
Flower Circus
Yellow
Bikes
poetry
Jellyfish
artwork
Cover: El
Grillo
Falling In Love
workshops
Play With Your Words
@ 826 Valencia - 1/11
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Issue Ten:
Free Write
Issue Eleven: Play
I
dislike feet. I don’t like the look of them, the smell of
them, or the taste of them. I suppose what I have is some sort
of backward foot fetish. Instead of the regular
run-of-the-mill "can I please lick your toes" kind
of foot fetish, it’s more of an "I’m totally repulsed
by feet but can’t stop looking at them" fetish. In
fact, the uglier the exposed footsies, the more I'm
disturbingly drawn to them. Perhaps it's akin to looking at a
train wreck; I just know it's gonna be gross, but I've just
gotta do it.
There’s
just something a little gross about feet. Sure, they do good
things, like hold us up no matter if we can fit into that
slinky size 9 dress or the larger, more voluminous size 12.
And they sure look great in a pair of fuck-me pumps. But, how
can you be completely enthralled by a body part that sprouts
little hairs on the toes, and soft jam between the digits?
Plus, there’s another "eww" factor that can’t be
ignored: They step on things. Gross things. Feet are a
breeding ground of germs and smells. And don’t even get me
started on bunions, calluses, fungus, hammertoes, and the
like!
To
keep the eww factor down, I like to keep my own fetid feet as
well-groomed as possible. So, when they started looking a bit
nasty the other day, I took ‘em for a walk to the local
beauty college for a cheap pedicure.
The
beauty college is located in a decaying part of town. I had to
fight off several gang members on my way there. It was
surprisingly easy, though. All I did was wave my toxic
tootsies in front of their bandana-clad heads, and they ran
off screaming like little girls.
An
instructor, a mustachioed nancy-boy, met me at the counter. I
told him my name and appointment time. He examined the book,
and said "Pedicure?" I said yes. He peered over the
top of the counter, and aimed his unwavering gaze at my feet.
His wrinkled nose and constipated smile let me know that my
feet had indeed reached the officially-nasty stage. I felt my
face redden with shame, and skulked off to sit with the rest
of the beauty college guinea pigs in the waiting area.
After
waiting for about five minutes, an older Asian lady approached
me and led me to a lopsided chair. After chatting with her for
a few moments I discovered that she did not have a good grasp
of the English language. So basically we smiled at each other
a lot, and she made various spastic hand motions when she
needed me to do something, like stick my foot in her mouth.
(Okay, so maybe I got that one wrong, but she seemed to like
it.)
After
sucking my toes clean (I could’ve sworn that she was
supposed to use a tub of water instead) she turned into the
Marquis de Sade. She unmercifully scraped my tootsies with a
hard bristle brush until they were raw. Then she took out some
lotion and proceeded to apply it to my reddened feet. I
thought it would be soothing, but I was wrong. It wasn’t an
ordinary lotion. Oh no, it was some sort of harshly irritating
skin-peeling lotion. The harder she rubbed, the more skin and
skin-related stuff came off. My feet started to burn, and just
when I thought I couldn’t stand it any longer, she stopped.
She
mumbled something in Chinese or Vietnamese or some sort of -ese,
and grabbed a toenail clipper. She shoved it in my face.
"Cut?" she asked. "Uh, yes, please. You are
just going to cut my toenails, aren’t you?" I replied
worriedly. She stared at me with a look I could not decipher,
then bent down and proceeded to clip my toenails. Or at least,
she pretended to do so. Every time I checked, they appeared to
be the exact same length as before. I asked her if she would
cut them shorter, and she just looked at me. I took that as a
no, or else she just simply didn’t understand. Either way,
the length she cut them was the length they stayed, whether I
liked it or not. I didn't, but what could I do? I was all out
of hand-motions, and there wasn't an instructor in sight.
After
a quick file to smooth the edges of my toenails, she moved on
to the part I dislike the most: cuticle removal. This part
always makes me queasy. This time was no exception, and in
fact, was intensified as this woman gouged, ripped, and shoved
my cuticles around with scary sharp instruments that may or
may not have been sterilized. During the twenty-minute ordeal,
I almost winced in pain a few times, but being the manly girl
that I am, I kept my pain to myself.
After
the dirty work was done, and the tears of pain were no longer
evident on my face, she turned back into Dr. Jekyll and gave
me a very relaxing massage. Ahhh.... rub, rub, pull, roll,
rub, rub, tug. Ecstasy. Let me tell you, after all that pain,
the massage felt soooo good. She even massaged my big old
shapely calves. I fell in love.
I
nodded off during the massage. She slapped me awake, and
motioned me over to pick out a nail color from her slim
collection of ninety-nine cent drugstore colors. Stunned and
dumbed from the slap, I told her with hand gestures and broken
English that I had brought my own way-cool color, so that when
I stub my toe, as I naturally will, I can do my own damn touch
up for free.
So,
she slathered on some clear polish, then artfully stroked on
my luscious lingonberry nail polish. After a second coat, and
some more clear polish, she looked at my feet, said something
in a foreign language and smiled. I take it that meant she did
a good job, so I thanked her and gave her a tip. Then, without
any warning, she snatched off the toe separators even though
my
toenails
were still wet, and she started cleaning up. She shouted
something undecipherable by me to her fellow students, they
cackled and looked my way as she left me sitting in the
lopsided chair.
Feeling
lost and confused, and cluelessly embarrassed, I slipped on my
thongs, grabbed my lingonberry polish, and hurried towards the
door. As I passed the mustachioed nancy-boy instructor, and
the lot of beauty college guinea pigs, I realized they were
all staring at my feet. Nancy-boy's constipated smile was
replaced by an evil leer, and the guinea pigs' eyes were
filled with desire. My fourteen dollar feet suddenly had
power. My pace slowed as I passed them, relishing their very
clear fascination with my feet. With feet like these, I could
rule the world.
Feeling
powerful, I headed out to my car. Outside, the lady who had
worked on my feet was standing a few yards away from my car,
surrounded by other students. She said something to them in
her native language, they looked at me and laughed. As I got
in my car, I gave her one last hand motion, and used my purty
right foot to step on the gas to hightail it outta there,
before she came after me with her cuticle removers.
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