You dream.
You hope. You pray.
You think it's over. That's it. It'll
never happen again.
You think it will never happen to you.
Not again. That special moment. That special knowing. That this is
good. That this is right.
And then, out of the blue, here in
England's north, it does happen. You find it.
The perfect one.
And the three words appear. Easily.
Unforced. Entirely of their own volition.
Lesbian Sheepdog Rage.
Utter. F**cking. Gold.
You see, this is why I haven't
submitted a blog entry for some time. I was, I now understand, simply
waiting. For the perfect opener. Waiting for those three golden words
that all seem like nouns. Although in this instance 'lesbian' becomes
an adjective. As opposed to a verb.
I've actually written about four blogs
in the last months and deemed none of them worthy. Not a one. Because
they began with sentences like:
“Any band that effectively uses
industrial catering platters as percussion gets the okay from me.”
Far too Sunday supplement.
“It is, as The Proclaimers so deftly
put it in 1987, over and done with.” Too 60 Minutes.
“F**king Shakespeare.” Just too
angry.
And so it is with some pride and a
small nod to Polyhymnia, the Muse of Sacred Poetry - and a condition
in people who have hurdled too much (they exist) - that I re-begin
today's blog.
Lesbian. Sheepdog. Rage.
And now I summon the Muse of Context!
(Hello Pat. Take a seat and help yourself to the scones. Thanks for
materialising.)
Right...context.
I'm currently in York working for the
local Theatre Royal. I suppose it'll have to do. I'm in a play called
Blue/Orange by Joe Penhall. A wordy little chamber piece. Actually,
it's a fucker full of verbal land-mines. It goes for over 2 hours and
there's only three of us in it. If you do the maths you'll realise
we've all had to memorise dictionaries of words. Dictionaries, I say
in an italicised fashion and here's a punctuation mark! Then join the
little bastards together and actorate them in roughly the right
order. Whilst diligently observing the specifically written beats and
… pauses … … … and silences … … … … … … … like
some fascist Michael Nyman soundtrack. It is, as you might well hear
in a traditional North Korean restaurant, a bitch.
Which is, of course, the sex of the
dog I mentioned in my sassy opener. (See what I did there?) The dog
is called Mika (pronounced MEE-ka although you knowing that doesn't
really alter the basic course of the story...actually I don't know if
it IS a story yet but let's all hold hands, forge ahead and remain
hopeful, eh?) and it belongs to my dear friend Catherine who lives in
the village of Goostrey (we're in England, what can I say...actually
what I can say is that there's a village up here called Penistone yes
you read that correctly so Goostrey is barely worthy of a cheeky
nipple tweak and a wink).
Catherine lives in this village with
her husband and two sons and, currently, 8 dogs. Jim and Kit are the
proud parents of five little sheepdogs, who, yes, were almost too
cute and made one feel one was in a Disney film or some project Steve
Martin might have walked into during what I call his
“Just...Steve...no...” period. You know the films I'm talking
about. I got so angry.
I summon the Muse of Just-Let-It-Go!
(Hi Gwen. Take a seat and help yourself to the scones. I think you
know Pat?)
And breathing out.
Anywhen, I'm at Catherine's. One
morning she's telling me how they'd wanted sheepdog Jim to get a
little Studio-54-Mezzanine-Level with sheepdog Mika, make some
puppies and a profit, but that Mika, strangely, wanted none of it.
I'm told this story as we look into the back garden and watch Mika
trying to hump Kit (mother I repeat mother of the pups), gums drawn
back and, I could have sworn, frowning.
“Have you considered...just for
arguments sake,” I begin delicately, witnessing the cleanly
unpenetrated air immediately to Kit's rear, “that you might, as
t'were, be the proud owner, and this is merely an observation, of
a...and I know we're a long way from London but I'm sure you'll
cope...a lesbian dog?” We both look out the window. Kit keeps
looking around and up, seeming like she needs to explain something to
Mika. And if Mika had the power of speech, I know she would have been
panting out the words, “Just go with it.”
I would have laughed had I not been in
similar situations myself a couple of times. Absinthe, eh?
Catherine nods. I can't remember her
exact verbal response but, like Liberace's mum, she must have had
alone times when her mind allowed certain thoughts.
The next morning we're in the kitchen.
All eight dogs are inside. Mika is furiously unhappy about the five
pups. Growls at them whenever they trot by in their cutesy,
internal-xylophone-soundtrack way. They simply ignore her, adding
insult to injury. “Our mum's not a lesbian, doo-da, doo-da.” How
they know the tune to Camptown Races is a thematic peg for another
time.
As you can imagine, and at this
juncture I really encourage you to do so, eight dogs and two humans
within one L-shaped kitchen is a mad scramble of pecking orders.
Jim, the Dogfather – heh heh, that wasn't pre-meditated – has no
idea where the pygmy dogs have come from and copes by sitting stock
still and looking at everyone and everything askance like he's just
beamed in from Kentucky, which is run by dogs. Kit's affection for
her weaned pups was left behind last week so she doesn't give a
flying duck f**k what they're doing.
Mika is growling at anything that
moves: female, male, canine, human, cutesy-wutesy or just looking
good for their age. Suddenly, she sees Kit caught in the corner of
the L-shaped kitchen. Our teenage mum is trying to find the one
calm spot in the room. Mika makes her move. She mounts Kit and, as
history has let us all know, Kit is entirely unenthralled. A bit like
me when my agent told me I had an audition for a UK tour of Carousel. Then some
puppies come close. Too close.
It's too much. Too many puppies. Too
many Two-Legs. Everyone's talking or barking or crying (I was getting
worked up about the Steve Martin movies again) and she's not getting
the commitment she wants from the bitch of her dreams.
It's at this moment that Mika's
growling goes from pissed off and ramps all the way up to Lesbian
Sheepdog Rage! It was terrifying. It was “Grizzly” and “Jaws”
and Laurence Fishburne playing Ike Turner in 1993's “What's Love
Got To Do With It” - where the hell IS Angela Bassett? - all rolled
into one growling, angry, for-the-love-of-Jon-Hamm-save-yourselves
scene. I've never seen an angrier lesbian sheepdog. Her growling
sounded like she was trying to give birth through a hole that didn't
even exist to another dog that was also growling. Her eyes popped
like a small goldfish you've accidentally stepped on at your friend's
house in Rotterdam. Her body language screamed “MINE! Stay back!”
which is an anagram of Ask My Cabinet which makes more sense than the
scene I was witnessing at the time. Mika wasn't even trying to
dry-hump Kit anymore, just holding on for dear life and pissed off
that she didn't have one, not one, opposable digit for purchase. She
looked ridiculous. And she knew it. Her paws sliding off to the side
every few seconds. Her pride and dignity sliding off more regularly
than that. Kit was whining. The puppies were barking. Catherine was
yelling “Stop!” Me crying. Hell, I don't even know if dry-humping
is the correct usage because we're dealing with a dog and a dog with
no penis at that! She wasn't even dressed! Where was I? I remember.
Goostrey.
It – was – UGLY.
The reviews for the play have been
just delightful.
Pat and Gwen have stopped feeding each
other bits of scone while Polyhymnia takes polaroids and all are now
discussing whether or not this was a story.
I think it was a beauty.
I'm still in York.
