Cold ain't sexy!

     Sometimes, I hate being broke. (Though, sometimes I love it.) There was a time when I thought it was noble. I was into that whole starving artist, living in a drafty garret thing. The whole idea seemed fabulous and sexy and tragic at the same time.

     This fantasy must have had its origins in my constant role-playing as a little girl. I used to dress up in old tattered clothes, as reasonable an approximation as I could make to medieval serf-wear. More times than not, I looked like a little serf-boy, but (to the eye-rolls of my older siblings), I called myself the Little Peasant Girl (I didn't know the word "serf" yet).

     Most of the time, being the Little Peasant Girl meant putting on my dull gray or shit brown torn clothes, going outside and climbing my favorite tree, and then rolling around in the dirt while keeping my hands up in the air (I couldn't stand having dirty hands). If the season was right, sometimes I'd rub mulberry juice on my face, instead, 'cause I didn't want to roll around in squashed mulberries.

     Anyway, after getting all dirty (as least, as dirty as I could bear without freaking out), I'd knock on my back door and beg for food.

     My grandmother would oblige -- giving me a bowl of warm water to wash my hands (I wasn't taking any chances), some stale bread, welfare cheese and a bowl of milk if I hadn't been too clumsy, lately.

     In winter, I practiced sleeping on the front porch with nothing but a thin blanket, until I got caught. (I haven't been right in the head since the first time I didn't get caught.) Waiting for my prince, I told the family. Freezing my ass off, more like.

     Shannon still uses the story as a bar trick, occasionally.

     "This is my sister, Tara. She used to like pretending she was a peasant. She'd dress up in old dirty clothes and knock on the back door. 'Oh please kind lady, might you spare a bit of food for a little peasant girl? A crust of bread? A hunk of cheese? A bowl of milk?' She did this waaay past age when the most kids stop pretending. I mean waaaaaaaaaay past. And my grandmother let her! She even helped get the clothes."

     And then she'll smile and hug me to her, and I'll grin at her audience idiotically.

     At which point, whatever hottie has been drooling over her, hanging on her every word, stops a minute to stare at me. I'm sure they're wondering how such a piece of perfection as Shannon ended up with a whack-job for a sister.

     But, that's not the point of my story.

     I grew out of my Little Peasant Girl phase, eventually. High school was tough and kids and teachers weren't quite as forgiving there as they had been before. Maybe if I'd joined Drama, the LPG would have stood a chance, but... well, that's a whole 'nother story and this one is taking long enough as it is.

     Anyhow, I'm all growed up and living by my lonesome, and though I no longer sleep in a drafty attic, and my apartment is filled with beautiful things, my toes are freezing (because I turned off the heat and my office doesn't get all that warm in the first place), most of my beautiful things were either given to me, or salvaged from the side of the road. (Okay, so I bought my mattress set from Macys and all of my bedding was purchased new. And I have a couple of things from IKEA, but, I swear, all the rest comes from Freecyle^TM, the trash or from those discount stores in Downtown Newark that may as well be giant rubbish bins.)

     Because I'm still that LPG at heart. I like it that my place is rocking this tastefully bohemian decor and that I hardly spent more than a couple thou furnishing the whole place (that's bedroom, kitchen, office, bathroom and living room. So, there!) I like it when people exclaim, "OMG! This was free?!?!? You found that in the garbage? Someone threw that away? OMG." (For the record, I'd like to differentiate between trash and garbage. Garbage is stinky and dirty and wet, and I would never touch it. Trash and rubbish are just the things idiots toss because they're too lazy to recycle.)

     That, and because, after seeing photos of my place, one of my editors suggested I write a book about it. (She didn't quite believe most of my stuff was free or salvaged.)

     The idea of a book deal is a pretty heady incentive. It feels entirely possible, give the tripe that gets published these days. But, dammit I could really use a pair of warm socks right now.