The Two Ls: Liability and Legality

This piece is intended as a satirical look at the kind of conversations that could happen between truly empowered women in our society. I've followed this scene with the transcript of the Sex and the City scene that it is based on. I'm considering fleshing it out, not really as a play or screenplay, but just using the format as a style choice. Let me know what you think, this is a very rough draft, I just wanted some feedback.

I should add that although I've obviously cribbed from existing material and persona both real and fictional, that no copyright infringement is intended. I've taken dramatic license with all of these elements, so obviously nothing herein should be considered as representative of any actual individuals or the creators of any fictional characters.




Dramatis Personae

Samantha: Pixie haired, balls to the wall, take no prisoners detective for the NYC SVU. Noted as a bit of a loose cannon renegade.

Charlotte: Petite redheaded special agent for the FBI in the under the radar X-files division, also a pathologist, Roman Catholic, noted skeptic.

Carrie: gracefully aging Senator and former first lady, was a front runner for the democratic presidential nomination, now returning to Senate work

Miranda: Silver haired and as spunky as she is professional, a celebrated newswoman, renowned for her genuine and candid, yet hard hitting interview style.


Int coffee shop:
(we find the ladies mid conversation)
Miranda: so I start the interview with your basic questions about his image, with a little nudge about toward the media's been treating his personal life.

Samantha: I'm more concerned with how they've been treating his wife.

Carrie: trust me ladies, there's no way to control that kind of thing, they've just gotta spin it to be about something else entirely. make it about his opponent's religious alliances.

Charlotte: But those alliances are not what they're made out to be, would engaging those same tactics really help to further anything positive in the long run?

Samantha: If it means he's reelected and can do what he hopes to do for his constituants, I think he's entitled to use whatever tactics get the job done.

Miranda: (with a snort) Clarence Darrow, ““Justice has nothing to do with what goes on in a courtroom; Justice is what comes out of a courtroom”

Carrie: (dryly) I think you used that quote during Big's impeachment hearing.

(Samantha fiddles with her napkin)

Samantha: I may have to deal with just that issue when I testify before the grand jury this week.

Miranda: So you're seriously considering going into court and committing perjury?

Samantha: Look, in my experience the law only goes so far and in some cases you have to let your own conscience guide you above and beyond some of the technicalities of in the legal system if you want to be able to sleep at night.

Miranda: Doesn't that go against what you stand for as a law enforcement officer?

Samantha: No, it goes against what I stand for to let a pedophile walk free when I know that I can make certain that he's put away and can't hurt any more children.

Charlotte: But isn't it a slippery slope to perjure yourself in one trial? It could call into question a lot of verdicts if you were found out.

Carrie: (muttered aside) If they were legit to begin with...

Samantha: (snaps) I know that I catch the bad guys and see them rot behind bars, and for me that's the bottom line!

Carrie: (apologetically) I understand Samantha, and at times I wish I could communicate my beliefs with your level of genuine passion and commitment, I can't even get Americans stirred up about improving their health care.

Samantha: Oh I get it. Look, I know you're passionate about health care reform, do you think it's maybe your program that you're having a hard time standing behind?

Miranda: Wait, are you thinking of rewriting the bill? retooling your plan?

Carrie: No, no, no. I believe in it, I just don't know how I'm going to present it in this press conference Tuesday.

Charlotte: Carrie, I think you already know the answer to that question.

Carrie: I know that the family of the boy is willing but I'm hesitant to go in that direction.

Charlotte: Do you know what I see in hospitals around the country in the course of my work?

Carrie: I'm aware of the horrific scenarios patients and doctors face every day, I just worry that by using a specific case I may send the wrong message.

Charlotte: Maybe hold the press conference in the health care facility, let the public see firsthand some of the issues you're addressing.

Carrie: I'm a politician, not a doctor, I'm concerned the public might be resentful if I stand in a hospital next to a sick boy in order to sell a bill.

Charlotte: But what is the difference between using a patient's story to sell health care and using a 9/11 fire fighter's story told from Ground Zero to sell the need for security?

Carrie: Was that tasteless grandstanding too, is that what I've become in the last 10 years?

Charlotte: That's not what I'm saying, I'm just saying that putting a human face on the issues can be very effective. I know that the FBI was forced to take abductions by our government or the aliens or whoever more seriously when they had to look me in the eye and know they'd given me cancer.

Miranda: Have we ever discussed you doing an interview with me?

(Charlotte rolls eyes)

Carrie: I just don't want to exploit this little boy in a political context.

Charlotte: But you'd be doing it to champion his cause.

Carrie: But it would still be political.

Miranda: You're a politician.

Carrie: Exactly, I don't want my constituents to see me as a talking head willing to take the chance on exploiting one of the most helpless of the people that she's representing.

Samantha: Who gives a fuck if you get the votes next time around if you actually manage to get some health care reform enacted in THIS term?

Carrie: I think that may just be what it comes down to.

Samantha: I'd do it in heart beat

Charlotte: So would I.

(miranda remains silent staring at her coffee)

Carrie: What do you think oh voice of experience?





Source scene from Sex and the City 4x02 "The Real Me"


INT. COFFEE SHOP


Miranda: I'll start with a salad with extra blue-cheese dressing, thank you.

Samantha: Are the vegetables on the veggie plate organic?

Carrie: They have beef potpie on the menu, what do you think?

Samantha: I'll just have a cup of hot water with lemon, thank you.

Charlotte: Isn't it hard to eat just organic all the time?

Samantha: Oh, it is so hard, last night I could not stop thinking about a BigMac. I finally had to get dressed go out and pick up a guy.

Miranda: Talk about a happy meal.

Carrie: Well, lady, you have never looked better, you're body is amazing.

Samantha: Wow, I hope so. I'm having nude photographs taken on Wednesday.

Miranda: What are you going to do, have post-cards made out to hand out to prospective dates?

Samantha: This is not about a man's approval. This photo is just for me so when I'm old and my tits are in my shoes I can look at it and say "Damn, I was hot."

Miranda: Isn't that a little narcissistic.

Samantha: No one thinks its narcissistic when you get your seventh grade picture taken.

Charlotte: You weren't naked in that!

Carrie: That we know of.

Samantha: Look, I like my body, I'm getting these pictures taken what's the big problem?

Carrie: No, problem. You are my hero. I think it's fantastic that you can just put it out there.

Carrie: I can't even say yes to being in some charity fashion show.

Samantha: New York style? You were asked to be part of that? That's huge! All the top designers are doing it.

Miranda: Wait, they want you to be a model?

Carrie: No, no, no. It's a mix of real people and models, I know the producer.

Charlotte: Carrie, you have to do it, you live for fashion.

Carrie: I do not live for fashion.

Charlotte: How many fashion shows did you drag me to during fashion week?

Carrie: Eight, what's your point?

Charlotte: Why are you turning down the chance to actually be in one.

Carrie: I do not belong on a runway, runways are for models not writers.

Charlotte: What's the difference between strutting down a runway and the way you strut down Fifth Avenue?

Carrie: Strut? Do I strut? Am I a strutter?

Charlotte: I think it'll be fun. I was a teen model when the Ralph Lauren store opened in Newhaven.

Miranda: Ok it's amazing I was able to keep my lunch down just now.

Carrie: I just... I cannot imagine walking down a runway where all the people sit there and judge me.

Charlotte: No one would judge you.

Carrie: We judge models all the time.

Miranda: But, you're not a model you're one of the real people.

Carrie: Exactly and I don't want people to think that I can't see the difference between a model and me.

Samantha: Who gives a fuck what people think, this is a fabulous opportunity. Honey, you'll probably get to keep the clothes.

Carrie: I thought of that!

Samantha: I'd do it in a New York minute

Charlotte: so would I.

Carrie: What do you think, mutey?

A Mid winter's Longing for Bloom

I ache for the inspiration of infatuation
The kinetic challenge of an equal and foil
For the tender forgiveness of acceptance
Mutual indulgences
Warm pulse filled comfort
The secret, silent language of eyes and gesture
The weightlessness of trust
The miracle of another's sentience
A fellow seeker
A partner in the quest

And some more from the more carnal corners of my mind

lust and archery

Days tick by
Tension stretches the bow
Your voice a finger
Pulling me out of frame
Holding me stead
Spreading me to turgid readiness
I'm concentrated in the string now
Quivering with desire
Fully extended
Pliable no more
Pulled to the brink with anticipatory ache
Unused energy compounds
the pressure
Your arrow poised against me
The torment of potential
Waiting
Baited for unfettered flight
Rigid with desire
for the moment when you
pluck me.

esoteric lust

dormant desire
murky depths stirred by primal incantation
the creature awakes
limbs stretch in luxurious waves of sensation
seeking...
driven by nature's mysticism
trembling with arcane need
polar opposites seek concrete warmth
magnetism of the flesh
steel girders of restraint made ephemeral
burned through by the fire of unabashed want
a graceless dance
made poetic in carnal intoxication
bewitching, pliant and pleasing
heights of bruising effervescence
playful eroticism of the nymph...

Brainfood: Symbolism Words vs. Archetypes

Symbols

So this all comes out of a conversation that I had with a very odd and very intelligent girl that I work with.....

I ended up somehow musing on the nature of the symbols that humans create, both large archetypal unconscious symbols and the most exact symbols that we possess....words and letters....

Language, words and letters, are like any symbol, but are incredibly refined. When they are arranged in specific patterns they form a specific concrete idea. They link our greater spiritual and unconscious "self" and its thought and images to matter. They can trap a section of an ever evolving greater reality into something of the earth and manageable.

Where more general archetypes and and symbols open us up to a multitude of ideas and images, language has the opposite effect. It breaks things down to very small ideas and images. This is a useful tool in day to day existence, but when we put it into the context of spirituality it is only a shadow of the whole of reality.

Archetypes and all that they represent are the strongest and broadest of symbols, they are a much fuller representation of humanity's spiritual side and the cosmos at large. Applying language to these larger symbols, especially in great detail, can cause a fluid universe to become rigid for us and can more easily be broken.


This is important when considering our relationship to religious texts....it seems to me that when we take them most literally and allow narrow interpretations of them that this is when people most easily distort them and end up taking actions and living lives that go against the very essence of the faith....

anyhoo, just some random thoughts for the day...feel free to ask questions or discuss, I'd be interested to hear everyone's thoughts....

A different type of women's issue

Today I'd like to ask a question about women, girls, hysteria, and the occult...

What goes on in the minds of women, and more particularly adolescent girls, that is so fascinated by the macabre? Why do witchcraft accusations spring from young girls? Why do poltergeist supposedly flock to them? What is the mysterious affliction of hysteria? Why would a pregnant teenager feel compelled to pen the tale of Frankenstein's monster? Why when there were public executions and displays of anatomy, did women and girls vie for front row seats? What is it that makes the feminine have this blood lust...this aura of almost supernatural energy at times?

I don't know the answers to these questions, but it seems to be a pattern...any theories are welcome...

Cockroaches and History

To the cockroach on my foot last night:

Ugly invader
you danced on my toes
did you fly in the window?
or come in on my clothes?
3am's not the hour
to come near my bed.
I'm sorry for the publication
that smashed in your head.
Took a second smack
to quiet your ends
But this is not a public venue
so don't tell your friends.
An end to my resting
is all that you made
But your solo did inspire me....

to pick up some Raid.



To the History Channel.

I love you,
I must
Because I'm a nerd
your DaVinci documentaries
they were the last word.
I'd take you over almost
all but Ken Burns.
But then there are some weeks
when your programming turns.
Someone needs to say it
these weeks get quite old.
And of course it is me
who will be that damn bold.
Though History International
sometimes gets me through
There's more to all of History
Than FUCKING WORLD WAR TWO!!!!

Erotic Poetry ie: Smutfest

On Q

slow, salty drip
evaporates on fevered skin
lazily stirring my dormant desire
breath becomes sensations
long, greedy glances,
zeroing in on the prey
phermones swirl and suck in cyclonic turbulence

an angled jaw
clenched in far off meditation
the stretch of a graceful beast
secure in his size and power
fabric shifts
revealing sculpted collarbone
enciting culinary urges
my lips in unconcious gesture
feel the heat of my stare

your eyes pull me into orbit
flush my cheeks
cast my eyes down
breath struggling for control
look back
ego seeking affirmation
your attentions held
my posture adjusts of its own volition
my body recieving your gaze as a touch
a wave of shadow sensation

this is where I get off
the game interrupted in transit
I exit amist the wafted scent of your arousal
a secret smile
a last moment of indulging elation
climb back to the noise and haze
seeking relief
craving release

momentarily

A moment
guards stand down
burn not for the world
but for one
any one
this one
here
now
flesh pounding
mind tearing
my body
climb in
I have
for now
sweet dark pleasure
danger
kinetic blood
static mind
animal sense
wilderness of urges
sensation is narcotic
dragons and deamons
let loose for the chase
taste my need
touch my center
for the timeless moment
before lockdown resumes

I continue to aspire to to be the "eat me beat me lady"

I,
your porcelin puppet,
move to your urging,
pull me up
lay me waste
turn my steel to jelly
dumbshow on a secret stage
of carnal and etheral bliss