Frantic and Bitter Lonely Ramblings Interrupted to the Point of
Incoherency
(With Apologies to Dan Brooks)
by Adam Hahn, the new guy
(Lights up)
Iowa City is quite possibly the only place on Earth where you
can not only pet the squirrels, but probably have sex with the ducks if you buy them a drink
first.
After a month in this city, I've had enough. I've had enough of
increasingly inedible cafeteria food, I've had enough of drunken 2 AM fight songs in the hallway,
and I've had enough of this theater, where it seems that the same ten people perform in each
others' pieces every single week.
If this is, in fact, a "no budget" theatre, why is it still a buck to
get in? If you paid a dollar, and you paid a dollar, and everyone behind the first two rows or so all
paid a dollar to get in, wouldn't that money, at some point, add up to a budget?
I need you here so the two of us can get away. I'll send home
one last U-bill to let Mom and Dad know I love them, and we can leave it all behind.
We'll look up used cars in the yellow pages, and we'll find the
boxiest automobile on the face of the Earth. We'll buy a 1987 Volvo station wagon with vinyl
seats and funny-looking head rests.
Oh, for the love of God, turn on the radio. Find some disco
music. Somewhere on that dial, ABBA is waiting for us to sing along in fake high-pitched voices
that really sound more like the Bee-Gees, so that for one magical moment, both of us will know
deep inside that we are the dancing queen.
"Queef". Is that just another word for a woman's. . .
womanhood?
We'll wave our arms and scream the words. For that moment
ABBA will be the most important and powerful band in all of history. We will pity the fools in this
world who do not comprehend the power of ABBA, and we will pity ourselves knowing that we'll
forget that power once the song is over. Despite the pity, we will feel wonderful and young and
free and in love, because that is who we are and that is the magic of disco.
If I had paid to get in three times, would that mean that I was
entitled to inflict three dollars worth of damage to the stage?
If I contract a carpenter to drain and replace a two foot by
four foot section of the floor for one hundred thirty-four dollars and seventy-five cents, then paid
to come in twenty times, then got one hundred and fourteen and three-fourths paying audience
member to agree that it would be really fucking cool to cut that hole in the floor, fill it with
Country Time Lemonade and then wrestle someone in it, if I challenged Dan Brooks to wrestle to
the death in that confined, wet space in five minutes or less, would I still be forbidden from
"damaging the space", or would I simply be forbidden from actually succeeding in killing
him?
We'll go to Wal-Mart. We'll browse for hours without buying,
past scented candles, prophylactics, and Star Wars toys to emerge with one bottle of IBC Root
Beer and one jar of baby dill pickles.
If I was going to wrestle "Danger" Brooks to death on stage,
would I still be expected to turn in a typewritten script ahead of time?
You and I will get up early the next morning to use our
yellow pages one more time, trading in our beautiful Volvo station wagon on a brown El Camino
with rusty fenders, bald tires, and no muffler.
We'll rattle our Camino far away from school, from
Wal-Mart, from everything else, away to somewhere grassy and secluded.
I'll shake the dust from an old blanket and spread it out on the
grass. We'll sprawl and bask together in the sunshine so that I might partake of the root beer, and
you of the baby dills.
I live in a dorm, and I've been pissing into the toilet. Did I
miss something during orientation?
I'll kiss you. You'll kiss me. You'll taste a sticky sweet root
beer residue, and I will taste vinegar. Even though I hate pickles, I'll love and savor that briny
flavor that is yours and yours alone.
Tasting each other, we'll ignore the setting sun. We'll pull the
blanket in around us and huddle together, ignoring both the stars above and the bug bites that will
itch like Hell in the morning.
Does having the balls to stand on stage and deliver one bad
monologue prove that I'm a man, or do I have to actually write something entertaining before my
masculinity is certain?
Forget running away with me, just come back to Iowa City.
Everything we need is here. There are grassy places where the sun shines. There is an arboretum
where I can spread a blanket when we're together, and there is a theater where I can kill time and
blow off frustration when we're not.
I can write ridiculous little scripts. I can make nine theatre
friends so the ten of us can perform in each others' pieces every week and intimidate the shy and
inexperienced freshman who will mistakenly admire us.
I think I'll stick around for a while. I'm not quite done with
this city after all.
So, wait a second, "Queef" doesn't just mean "vagina", it
means. . . Oh, God!
(Lights down)
"Frantic and Bitter Lonely Ramblings Interrupted to the Point of Incoherency" debuted September 24, 1999 performed by Adam Hahn.
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