Lou Sanz

A BRIEF MESSAGE FROM THE AUTHOR…

Ok, so we all know sometimes I can’t spell, my grammar can be questionable and let’s just say that not all my stories have inspired hope in humanity – but f#@k, for the most part they’ve been mildly amusing and you seem to have enjoyed them and for that I just wanted to say thanks.

We’ve had a long year, one of ups and downs, hits and misses and sure things might’ve run more smoothly for all of us if I’d put out more consistently, but that’s what New Years resolutions are for. (NOTE TO SELF: just say yes, it can’t always end badly and that’s what antibiotics are for- they want you to catch stuff and use them, it’s the only way they can end up curing everything…)

Some highlights have included:

The time I got arrested on public transport for not showing a girl how to put on eye liner http://lousanz.com/?p=4

oh, and it makes me laugh now…but the time I found a lump under my arm http://lousanz.com/?p=72

One of the many times I got turned down by a boy…lol
http://lousanz.com/?p=84

and then lets not forget when I turned down the opportunity to shag a 17 year old http://lousanz.com/?p=88

And Thom Yorke still isn’t talking to me – bastard!
http://lousanz.com/?p=96

Oh, it’s been good times, good times and life can only get more traumatic and hillarious as time moves forward and I age, older than I am now.

So thank you for being such avid readers – it’s so lovely to know that people still like a story.

Thanks to all those that have provided feed back – big shout outs to Jackson, Josh, Ewan, Em, Anna and many, many more.

Happy New Year.

FROM THE AUTHOR
http://lousanz.com

I’m not sure when exactly Christmas got banned in my house. There was an awkward stage where we pretended it didn’t really exist between 1993-95 following an incident involving my father dressed as Magnum PI dressed as Santa after he was discovered under the Christmas tree in nothing but his underpants, my mother and a simple keyboard dedication that he was serenading her with on my new Yamaha keyboard. It returned for a short while until 1997, when my mother upon getting yet another frying pan banned Christmas until her family learnt not to buy ‘crap’ presents, and with that in mind, now looking back that perhaps the moment the festive season ended in the Sanz house.

Personally I agreed with mum. Our family ritual of Kris Kringle had been less than spectacular and had been growing worse by the year. It started off with potential; an indiscriminate statue I used to hold open my door from my brother, but it was downhill from there –the next year I got that extra bag of crisps you get when you buy a chocolate bar and a soft drink at the petrol station and the year after that I got a film poster with the ‘Now Showing’ sticker still attached and the blue tack still firmly in place on the back (just to clarify, my brother had recently taken a job at a local picture theatre).

As far as I was concerned Christmas was what other people did, much like home buying, private health insurance and coffee grinders. Well that was until I moved to London.

I lived with a gay man, who didn’t go in much for Christmas, because according to governing legislation at the time the cultural ideals behind Christmas didn’t really go into him and anyway, Ibiza wasn’t nearly as packed at this time of year, and a Jew. A Jew who was surprisingly more into Christmas than any Christian I’d ever met, but his logic was reasoned enough – given he didn’t believe in Christmas it was easier for him to enjoy because it didn’t have to mean anything.

I’d agreed to bunk down for Christmas at an Australian friend of mine’s orphan’s lunch. She’d gone as far as to extend the invitation to my Jew flatmate, who was on the verge anyway of becoming my long-term on and off again better half (I use that term liberally, but hey it’s Christmas) and even with my Grinch like ways I was kind of excited about spending a white Christmas around people I actually liked, free of movie posters and crap statues – I could hold my own doors open thank you very much…and then of course everything pretty much went tits up.

Four days before Christmas, my friend rang, she was pregnant and feeling rotten and there was ‘no f&*king way’ she was going to cook a full Christmas lunch for people quite capable of cooking themselves – and then she apologised, blamed hormones and hung up.

‘Merry Christmas to you to’ I mumbled into the dead phone as my flatmate came around the corner.

‘What’s up?’ He was so good at acting concerned; I knew now why I thought I might kinda like him.

‘Di’s cancelled Christmas.’

‘Oh…can she do that?’

‘Apparently so.’

‘But I didn’t see anything on the news about it.’

‘I was exaggerating.’

‘You’re a bit prone to that isn’t you Lou?’

I practised ignoring him and if I do say so myself I was getting very good at it.

‘Anyway, maybe I can just cook something here and we can grab some videos and just hang out together….’

‘Sure, sounds great.’ He agreed, as he grabbed his coat, going off to see her.

And with that he left the flat. I was totally ok with him still being good friends with his ex-girlfriend and if anything it was reassuring, I mean we’d probably end up being exes one day and if we still hung out and stuff that would be totally fine to and nothing at all to be concerned about (hindsight has been something fundamentally lacking in any decision making about my life from such an early point I never thought to consult it in moments such as this one).

So off he went and as if almost on cue the house phone rang. It was my friend Lisa. She wanted to say good bye before her and a bunch of my friends headed off to the country for the holiday.

‘It’s such a shame you can’t come Lou’

‘…well my Aussie Christmas just cancelled…’

‘Oh.’

‘Yep’.

‘Oh Lou, I’d ask you to come with us, but only if we’d known sooner, like when we asked you, cause there’s no room in the car and cottage, well we don’t have a floorboard to spare…but if you’d told us earlier…’ her guilt trailed off….

‘I’m ok really, Nathan and I are going to cook a turkey or something to that affect and just hang out.’

‘Nice to see you’re shaking things up Lou, I mean you and Nathan hanging out and doing nothing together is just so…what’s that word I’m looking for……come on Lou, you’re good with words, help me out.’

‘Predictable?’

‘No.’

‘Sad, tragic…come on Lisa, I’m giving you gold here.’

‘It’s just so retired.’

‘You make it sound like an afternoon of canasta and self-defecation for two.’

‘I’m sorry Lou, it sounds charming and remember darl if I could be bothered agreeing to take both cars to the country like Marcus wants than we’d be more than happy to have you tag along.’

‘What-?’

‘– anyway, must go Lou, drinking and merriment to be had you understand.’

She hung up, leaving me perplexed as to why she even bothered to call. She was so not getting an eCard this Christmas, maybe a text, but she’d be out of range so what was the point? And I really couldn’t afford to just be throwing money around.

It was decided then, no text either. Lisa would have to resign herself to having me ask her how her holiday was, as opposed to me wishing her a happy one.

I had plans anyway, I needed to decide if I was going to cook chicken or turkey, or could I possible pull off a multi-bird lunch? But of course the first thing to do was to get a tree, and living on Columbia Rd, the home of the flower markets I was going to get the best tree ever.

…of course, I’d left it rather late and so instead of a towering green Christmassy foliage decorating my living room, I was sold a stick in a pot, that looked like it might be related to Christmas in the way that Anthony LaPaglia’s younger brother kinda looks like him, but isn’t really him. I tried not to cry, I could make it look pretty, nothing some tinsel and self denial couldn’t fix.

I was just about finished with the decorations when Nathan came home. He took one look at our Christmas tree and commented that maybe I should throw last nights left-over’s out as opposed to decorating them – I told him it was our brand new Christmas tree. He told me my tree was why Jews didn’t celebrate Christmas.

‘I’m trying to make Christmas special.’

‘You know what happens when you try Lou.’

‘I succeed in bringing the spirit of Christmas right to your doorstep?’

‘Now you know that’s not true LouLou.’

He took his scarf off and plonked on the couch. The uncomfortable couch – why was he punishing himself….

‘Lou…I don’t think I’m going to be here for Christmas.’

‘What? I’m cooking, I even got a retarded stick in a pot that God knows I’m trying to convince myself is a Christmas tree – look I even stuck up stockings!’

I pointed at two odd little socketts I’d sticky taped to the mantle, and as if on cue one fell to the ground – mine.

‘Yeah, it’s just that Carrie, well she’s had a bad year and she wants me to come with her and her family to the country and I’m her friend…’

‘…you’re her ex boyfriend…’

‘Yes, and with that comes certain obligations…’

I looked at my little sockett; thought of my multi bird feast I’d just ordered online at Tesco’s and did the only thing left that I could.

‘You’re right, you should go, and I’ll be fine here alone on my own.’

‘Really?’

He jumped on to the comfortable couch, self imposed punishment over.

‘You’re tops Lou, I thought you’d say that, you’re much better at being alone then anyone I know, you can do some of your writing stuff.’

He flicked over the channel to watch some carollers singing with Mariah Carey.

‘Yep, I’m great at the alone…and writing stuff…’

I glared at the telly, trying not to cry. Shut the cock up Mariah, bullshit you don’t ask a lot for Christmas, stop with your lies and just leave me alone.

Christmas day arrived; I woke up, decided not to wash, scratched myself and looked out the window. London town was completely empty, not a soul in site, except for the occasional mini cab driver and prostitute who’s kids were with dad on his dad day.

My phone rang, it was Nathan. He was feeling bad, and had decided to return on Boxing Day, I pointed out no trains were running that day, he fell silent before adding ‘it’s the thought that counts’…or the lack of thought in your case I joked to myself, glad I could still make funnies on a day I wasn’t entirely sure I’d make it to the end of.

There was nothing on the tellie except for floats, God and good will to all. I decided 9am was not too early to start the celebrations and so I opened a bottle of champagne, sat under my stick in a pot and opened my Christmas presents. Mum had sent me a card saying my present was her renewing my car insurance so my sister could drive around, or as she phrased it ‘your dad and I thought peace of mind was what you needed this Christmas.’ My brother had sent nothing, and Nathan had left me a plastic tomato to put ketchup in – that was it! Christmas was officially over!

I packed up my stick and pot, ripped the socketts from the wall, washed myself with a flannel and decided to go for a walk.

The air was cold and brittle as I looked up and down the length of my street. I was excited, this was liberating. I wasn’t going to be sucked into feeling sorry for myself. Nothing was going to make me feel any worse, not my sister driving my car, not Nathan maybe or maybe not fingering his ex girlfriend by a warm lit fire, not this strange man looking at from across the street…the empty street…the completely empty street.

Great, I was going to be offended sexually and it was going to all be my fault because I was so unloved I was spending Christmas on my own that the attentions of a would be rapist was my Christmas present to myself (Note to self: stop spoiling yourself so much Lou, it’s just got to stop.)

He wandered over as I searched for my flat key – I just had it, where the hell was it?

‘Hi’ he spoke in a clipped English accent.

I didn’t reply.

‘You don’t speak English?’

He was the politest potential sex offender ever, but hey it was Christmas.

‘..Um I’m just trying to find my key.’

‘We could go to my car if you like; I mean if that would be more efficient?’

Oh, I smiled to myself…he wasn’t a sex offender, he was just a regular old punter looking for sex on Christmas day…his family probably waiting for him to return from the Indian off-licence with much needed Worcestershire sauce that he was sent out for – and him thinking while he was out he could get his end in, after all as I kept reminding myself, it was Christmas.

‘I’m not a prostitute.’

‘Oh, it’s just you were on your on your own.’

‘And so you assumed I was soliciting?’

‘When you say it like that it sounds dirty.’

‘Don’t you have a family to be with?’

‘I could say the same of you.’

And so there I was locked in a stale mate with a man looking to pay for sex on Christmas day and me, an Australian expat standing alone in the middle of London trying to convince herself she didn’t care.

‘Listen, maybe we can grab a drink’ I remarked – after all aren’t all men who are looking to pay for sex really just wanting companionship?

‘As lovely an offer as it is, I’m really just looking for a decent hand job before the in laws come over.’

‘Fair enough.’

He looked down at his shoes, as he fumbled with his car keys.

‘I better be off than, might try round the corner.’

He started off down the street and then suddenly turned around.

‘Merry Christmas strange Australian girl.’

‘Merry Christmas to you to’ I shouted back and then smiled to myself – I still had that Christmas spirit and at the end of the day that was the most important thing.

Confiding in me over a hot chocolate in a small tucked away café a few days ago, my friend Agnes had barely touched her earl grey tea with a dash of cream and honey when she pouted and declared

‘I hate myself Lou, I just hate myself.’

I didn’t say anything, I knew there was more to come, there always was.

‘I just don’t understand why you can’t just be born the way you want to end up?’

‘You are asking an awful lot from the universe’ I surmised as I eyed off a marshmallow that wasn’t mine, but had been left on a nearby table.

‘No Lou, I don’t think I am. We put all this money into obesity research, diabetes this and diabetes that and don’t even get me started on early stage genetic predisposition testing and yet if we could just be born thin and beautiful, not necessarily smart but cluey, I could make do with cluey, well then you know what Lou?’

‘What’ …surely if it was just left there it was really MY marshmallow….

‘There’d be no war or famine.’

‘And how do you reckon that?’

‘Because it’s simple – they’d be born full.’

She squeezed more lemon into her tea and winced at the taste, which led me to this point – can you divorce your friends? Or at least if anything ask for a trial separation?

I thought this as I watched her straighten out her skirt, looking around, frustrated with the world, unaware of her complete lack of depth – why couldn’t I be completely unaware of her lack of depth too?

‘I think maybe darl, you just need to learn to accept yourself – you know a little self acceptance can go a long way.’ I remarked

…it’s my marshmallow, all mine and boy did it taste good…

‘Lou, I’m not giving up sex.’

‘Acceptance is not the same as abstinence Agnes,’

‘Don’t get tricky Lou.’

‘I wasn’t being tricky; I was going more for clarification really.’

Suddenly her nose screwed up.

‘Did you just eat that manky marshmallow off someone else’s table?’

‘I think manky is too liberal a use of such a negative word.’

‘You just ate garbage Lou.’

‘Are abandoned children garbage Agnes?’

‘Wards of the state are not marshmallows’ are they Lou.’…more a statement than a question really…

I picked a loose hair out of my teeth; she was right, it probably had been garbage, but her judgment wasn’t my punishment for little did she know that later that night in the privacy of my own home I would stand naked in front a mirror and ask myself ‘would you touch yourself?’ and my answer would be yes and thus eating garbage made me edgy and that was hot.

‘I just wish I could be more like you Lou’ she let out a long breath as she checked her iPhone for the time.

‘Grass is always greener on the other side my friend.’

‘You’re short; one might even describe you as homely and unkempt – almost like that character in House.’

‘What character in House?’

‘Oh you know, the eccentric aunt who collects newspapers and rides the trains, rather than just being normal and going on a diet.’

‘It’s called Housekeeping and it’s a book and I think you’ve missed the entire point of the story – it’s about Housekeeping in the spiritual sense, in the face of great loss.’

‘My point exactly – if we were born the way we wanted than she wouldn’t have become a hobo.’

‘You do realize you’re whole argument is derailed if say she wanted to be born a hobo.’

‘You honestly think she’d pick being born Kate Moss over being born homeless?’

‘No, you’re right Agnes, why find your own path and sense of identity when you can just claim someone else’s – cloning is much underrated.’

‘Don’t do that.’

‘Do what?’

‘That.’ – I really felt like a biscuit, but maybe that was too much. I found myself lamenting an incident earlier that day when I’d dropped and stepped on my biscuit – there was no saving it at the time I thought, but looking back now, I knew the truth, I hadn’t even tried.

‘Listen Lou, I hoped it wouldn’t come to this.’

‘Come to what?’

‘I need a time out – from this, from you.’

…what was going on…this wasn’t meant to end this way, we had plans together, great plans, the Kinki Gerlinki garage sale was only a week away…

‘I don’t think I’ve got room for you in my life, I’ve already got a stereotypical over achieving, blatantly sarcastic, bordering on compensating for an amazing amount of insecurity – brunette taking up too much room.’

‘Who? Who’s that?’ I demanded to know.

‘a little tabloid princess I like to call Katie Holmes.’

‘But you don’t even know her and please prey tell when if ever has displayed irreverent wit?

‘Just because I don’t know her personally Lou, doesn’t mean that we haven’t connected.’

‘She’s a celebrity, if this is the Matrix than she’s not even real.’

‘But she understands me Lou and quite frankly you don’t; in fact half the time I just feel like you’re taking the piss.’

‘No, that’s not true, entirely.’

‘See, you can’t even not do it now, even while we’re in the middle of breaking up – do I mean that little to you?’

‘I don’t know what you want from me.’

She paused.

‘Maybe the problem is I don’t know either.’

I held back my already restrained emotions on the matter.

‘Hey Lou, don’t get upset, we can still be Facebook friends.’

‘Really?’ – it wasn’t the end of us.

‘Restricted access of course.’ And with that she stabbed me in the ovaries.

‘What’s the point?’ I spat back.

She got up to leave.

‘Can I ask why?’

I did desperate well.

She turned and for a moment I thought she might sit back down and tell me this was all a dream, or a test, something other than blatant abandonment.

‘Listen Lou – oh how do I explain this… ?’

I saw her eyes search for words.

‘…you know that marshmallow you ate, the abandoned one?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well you’re like my marshmallow, on the floor, hair all over you, and sure if I wiped you down or hosed you off I might for a moment get that sweet sensation only a marshmallow can give me as it touches my lips, but than the guilt would set in, the self hate, that yearning for something more in my life – do you understand?’

‘I’m not a marshmallow.’

She took a long breath.

‘You’re not my marshmallow Lou.’

And with that she left…and for me it was time to go home and stand in front of the mirror – I was going to treat myself tonight.

I’m really going to stop walking home. Sure I need the exercise but for the sake of my sanity and at the risk of exacerbating my already impotent nature when it comes to relating to the average person, I really think I must stop.

To be honest though, this is not something that has gradually been eating away at me, adding to my state of restless sleep and unsatisfying daily minutiae; it has it’s nexus firmly rooted in an encounter I had on Tuesday, and before you judge me with me with your judging hats (I should know, I own 3 in various colours) this is not an over reaction, well 3 days later it isn’t, but possibly on retrospect it might be seen as a slightly over zealous and ill thought out move on my part.

Her name was Betty. She was, and is one of my on-and-off again friends. The sort that always seem like a good idea at the time, but 20 minutes into a lecture from them on how cork shoes never really got a fair run, not to mention Espadrilles and it’s all Jennifer Aniston’s fault, you can understand why Brad left her for Angelina – you stare at them with all the hatred you can muster and then come to the crushing realisation that being with them only makes you hate yourself more.

But my Betty was worse than that; spending more then an Australia Day lunch with her made me want to do things to myself, bad things to myself. Like the time I actually contemplated going home, foraging around my clutter cupboard for my tennis racket, far from it’s glory days of Under 15 Round Robin matches and immersing it in a bath of rust and lime scales for 24-48 hours, where upon immersion complete I would de-string it, leave it in the rain and then after a couple of whiskeys insert it either orally or otherwise into myself and scraping my insides out.

And yet here I was now, walking in the middle of the city, unaware that she was right behind me – that is until she yanked my iPod ear phones out of my ear, and then in front of everyone I screamed ‘I’m being assaulted’ which was not only humiliating to myself, but a point of great concern to everyone walking past who really quite clearly didn’t give a toss – I felt comforted in the knowledge that had I been being assaulted the most I could hope for was a couple testing out their new iPhone posting yet another urban stereotype on YouTube with the tag line ‘the girl who got over excited when her friend touched her.’

Now, here’s the thing, I’ve only recently surrendered my Sony Discman because after scratching my forth copy of Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation and then being informed it is no longer available to purchase in any other format than Mp3 (yes, I felt like chaining myself to a Sanity Christmas display stand as well) I conceded defeat and got an iPod, nothing fancy, you can’t touch the screen, but it’s mine and I’ll be damned if anyone other than myself or a mugger yank it out of my ears…

‘What the hell?’ I spun around only to come face to face with Betty.

‘Hey’ she offered back – no apology, no nothing, as I struggled to pick up my head set and stuff it in my hand bag.

‘That kinda hurt’ I muttered…

‘Hurt – what hurt?’

‘When you pulled my head back via my earphones just now’

‘Did I?’ she stated – it wasn’t a question, she knew what she had done – let the dance begin I thought. Let us dance.

‘I haven’t seen you since Australia Day – you never call, why is it you never call Lou?’

‘I invited you to my birthday’

‘Ahh, yes, Sex and the City was on at the IMAX the next night and I really needed to rest my eyes.’

‘Fair enough.’

‘Yep’

‘And I invited you to my show’.

‘Oh…well Andrew didn’t want to go.’

‘Andrew?

‘I got a new boyfriend, well he really started out a f**k buddy but than I thought come on Betty you’re over 25 and you have to start getting serious about your life, like what if the world ends and you have no one to get on the Arc with, like I’m sure they’ll be a boat for the singles, but really what would God get of saving them, I mean really – how committed are you in saving humanity if you aren’t willing to breed for existence right? And anyway, Andrews doesn’t really like funny girls, which has really kept me in check, I can tell you.’

‘Fair enough’

‘You know Andrew anyway; you went to high school together’

‘Yep.’ – we never spoke, most of our interaction coming to down to him coming up with a scoring system of how many things the boys in class could get down my top without me noticing.

‘So what’s new with you Lou?’

‘Not much.’

‘Still living with your parents?’

‘Yep.’

‘That’s not very good is it? – Not very good for your ‘life’ hey?’

‘I don’t have a ‘life’ so it suits me just fine. I’m actually very busy.’

‘You just said you weren’t doing much.’

‘Well its just stuff, like I have (oh please Lou, don’t stoop this low) – I have a couple of scripts I’m developing.’

‘That’s great Lou, just great. I tend to think screenwriting is like how everyone was in a band in the 90’s won’t you agree?’

‘Not really, I think there’s a lot more to it –‘

‘– I’m just trying to say that isn’t everyone developing a screenplay? Like my autistic cousin Benji could have something development if he was so inclined – surely you agree Lou?’ - Again, not a question, more a statement.

‘I guess if he was motivated that way’

‘Don’t be cruel Lou, for god sake he’s autistic.’

I had nothing to say, she was right, I had been cruel – cruel for thinking that at right that very moment she was talking to me I was thinking that I really wanted to be home self-harming myself live on the web.

‘What you listening to anyway?’ she grabbed at my iPod and examined for evidence of music.

‘Dannii Minogue?’ she quipped, reluctant to give it back to me like a mother who just discovered her toddler was playing with laundry detergent.

‘Yes, Dannii’ – judging hats on!

And she scrolled through my selection I could see her face despair – but that was cool, I was ready for this, and I’d been waiting for this moment all my life.

Her head shot up ‘You’ve got her entire back catalogue Lou.’

‘Yeah, lots of people do.’

‘That’s not true, is it Lou?’

‘As a matter of fact there are a lot of us out there who think Dannii has done a lot more for modern music than anyone is willing to give her credit for.’

I knew it was a bold statement, yes, I also know there wasn’t much to back it up and her ill fated marriage to Julian McMahon and her slight dalliance with being a darling of the Right in 2002 following a poorly interpreted magazine interview about the French fascist president at the time did tear at her credibility – but I wasn’t backing down.

I snatched my iPod back.

‘How soon we forget how important she is culturally to us! – I mean what? Have we all forgotten Secrets! Or how she made every frumpy brunette in Australia actually think they too could be on Young Talent Time! Or how she was nominated for a Gold Logie! And yes, we’d all like to forget ‘This is It’ but you can’t honestly say that Neon Nights did not have some well earned party anthem highlights, and sure she looks a little strange now in the flesh and slightly out of proportion – but she’s the accessible Minogue and for that, and that reason alone I will always go to bat for her and so Betty if you want to make something of this go right ahead, but her music gives me a much needed spring to my step as I walk home and no one is going to take that away from me – no one….especially not the likes of you.’

For a moment she said nothing, nor did the crowd that had gathered for my rousing ‘Pro Dannii’ speech. For a moment I expected a slow clap to start rumbling up through the crowd of 5 or so, I expected Betty to look at me with tears in her eyes and thank me for finally making it ok to like Dannii, something so many of us have been seeking permission for, for years…

…but as the crowd left to go and watch a guy talk to himself on the other side of Bourke St Mall, I was not left with a liberated and admiring Betty but was faced instead with a Betty who know longer knew the person that stood before her.

‘Listen Lou…’

She reached her arm up to my shoulder, but quickly pulled away, as if correcting herself.

‘I – it’s just don’t think we can be friends anymore, well not for now anyway….you seem a little lost and I’ve made a promise to myself to only surround myself with people who have direction and a firm grasp on what is right and wrong, and from what I’ve just witnessed Lou, you can no longer tell the difference. Take care Lou.’

And with that she looked at me one last time, clutching my iPod and started to walk away…but it was ok, I had Dannii and you know what that’s all I needed.

And so, looking back and with the kindness of hindsight it would be wrong of me to stop walking home, sure it reaffirms that my talent lies almost exclusively in alienating people and losing friends (to misquote a book) but more importantly because if no ones actually listening to Dannii does she really exist?