Literacy

It's important, yo.

Other People's Trout

Only the very young and the very old may recount their dreams at breakfast, dwell upon self, interrupt with memories of beach picnics and favorite Liberty lawn dresses and the rainbow trout in a creek near Colorado Springs.
The rest of us are expected, rightly, to affect absorption in other people's favorite dresses, other people's trout.

--Joan Didion, "On Keeping a Notebook"

It occurs to me that writing a blog is indulgent in the same way that sharing your dreams is, so I figure it's not a big leap to write a post about my dreams. Which, of late, have all been anxiety dreams and fairly easy to interpret. It bothers me when the meaning of my dreams is so transparent; I get insulted on behalf of my subconscious, feel like it should be more clever. I shouldn't literally be dreaming about the real things in my life that are worrying me, but figurative, highly abstract representations of those things. I went to an Ivy League school, goddammit.

Last night, I dreamed that I cheated on my boyfriend with Richard Blaise from Top Chef. I do not find Richard Blaise attractive and if he ever tried to make me eat his bacon ice cream, I would vomit on his face. What I kept thinking, as I was fellating Blaise, was "how I am going to explain this to Noah?" (Noah = boyfriend) Sure, I have had the occasional sex dream about David Cook (who hasn't?), but fantasizing about our new American Idol and a Top Chef cast-off of questionable sexual orientation are two very different things. Troublesome trout indeed.

This dream was followed by one in which I was trying to get my collegiate women's a cappella group, Whim 'n Rhythm, on time to a concert in the Hamptons. But somehow I got sidetracked and found myself wandering inexplicably around a mall, shoplifting cosmetics. And finally--yes, I had all 3 of these dreams last night--I was at an audition for NYU's acting graduate program, frantically trying to remember the lines to a monologue I haven't performed in months. I have this dream and several variations of it all the time, even though I haven't auditioned for anything in the past six months. It's the actor's version of the academic stress dream everyone seems to have, the one where they are supposed to take a final exam they haven't prepared at all for.

Oddly, I've never had that dream, or the one where you are in public and suddenly realize that you are naked. My humiliation/body shame dream is much stranger -- I'm in the company of friends, usually at someone's apartment or at a party, and suddenly I realize that I am masturbating in front of them. Like, I somehow just forgot that you don't do that in public. Unless you're this man:

So, here's what I have deduced from a careful analysis of my dreams: I'm fucking stressed out. Or, as my former therapist helpfully phrased it in almost every session we had, "Katie, it sounds like you're having some difficult feelings that are making you anxious." Thanks, Freud.

Fathers Know Best

In honor of Father's Day, I thought I would give a shout-out to my dad, Steve Vagnino. My dad likes to joke that he is a "Renaissance failure": a man who has attempted many different career paths, but failed at all of them. It's true, his band Steve Persia and the Progressions didn't really take off. His film, "A Pleasure Doing Business," despite a cast that included Phyllis Diller and Tom Smothers (of the Smothers Brothers!), crashed at the box office. And the only remaining bottles of wine produced by Vanino Cellars are in our basement. Regardless, my dad has led an incredibly colorful and fascinating life, and he is a near-perfect father. Four kids, and none of us are in jail or Republicans, so he must have done something right.

My childhood was entertaining, to say the least. Some of my favorite memories involve my dad at the piano, making up ludicrous songs. The jazzy ballad "Hamburger Plaza" is about a fictional place of work where hamburgers of all types and sizes are made. The showtune-esque "Grab Your Hat and Your Patagonia" reinforces the importance of not leaving the house without an appropriate jacket.

Inventing practical/educational games is another one of my father's gifts. For instance, fighting over mini boxes of Frosted Flakes and Pops from the Kellogg's variety pack became moot once Cereal Roulette was created, a game wherein all the cereals in the pack (including the dreaded Total) were put into a salad spinner, mixed up, and distributed at random. And I will never forget which months only have 30 days, thanks to the rhyme my dad taught me, which makes no sense and yet is seared into my brain:

Thirty days have September, April, June, and November
All the rest like peanut butter
Except Grandma; she drives a Buick.

The legacy lives on with my youngest brother,11-year-old J.T., who studies for his weekly spelling test with the assistance of Spelling Bear, a stuffed bear voiced by my dad with an unfortunate masochistic streak. Whenever J.T. spells a word incorrectly, Spelling Bear becomes very distressed and resorts to repeatedly punching himself in his felt face. The game's only flaw is that Spelling Bear's joyous reaction when J.T. gets a word right is not nearly as funny, which may account for my brother's weak spelling skills to this very day.

Though our family vacations often resemble those of the Griswolds, the film dad that most resembles mine is undoubtedly Steve Martin in "Parenthood." I was hoping to find a clip on YouTube of the scene where he dons bath mats as chaps and becomes balloon impresario "Cowboy Gil" at his son's birthday party, but the picture will have to suffice. That's absolutely the kind of thing my dad did all the time when I was growing up. And I am a better (and funnier) person because of it.

Final fatherly wisdom:

"As long as what comes out of the sausage-maker looks like sausage, no one cares if the pig had a bad day." -Steve Vagnino, 6/9/08

Academia, how I've missed you!

I knew I was ready to go back to school, but I didn't realize just how ready I was until I read this in my grad school course catalog:

Students do a significant amount of primary and secondary reading. Classes are conducted in a seminar format where students do at least one presentation.

Students do a minimum of 25 pages of critical writing that includes at least one 10 – 20 page analytical research essay.

In this class that will mean either two 10-pg research papers; or one 20-pg paper. “Analytical research essay” means a scholarly paper, requiring significant research, not an op-ed essay. The balance of the 25pg min. will be made up by weekly reading responses.

...and got a grad school hard-on. You know you're ready to leave the workforce when the idea of writing reading responses (weekly!) and the promise of "significant amounts of primary and secondary reading" gets you all hot and bothered.

"This, too, shall pass..."

This phrase became all the more relevant last week, when I learned that I had a kidney stone.

What, you didn't know I was a 60-year-old man? Me either. I beat the odds-- kidney stones are most common in men over 40. But my kidneys are extra, extra special.

When I tell people about my kidney stone, they look horrified and ask about the pain. Men say it's akin to giving birth. Like they would know, but regardless, that's not what it was like for me. Maybe I have a high pain threshold, or maybe the aforementioned men are just sissies. Unclear.

The worst part of the experience for me was getting a CT scan. My doctor sent me to this fancy place on the Upper East Side that specializes in medical imaging technology

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(MRIs, ultrasounds, etc). The place was more air-conditioned than the 6 train and very posh -- leather sofas, Sinatra playing softly in the background, tasteful wall sconces. It was like a Swiss chateau; I was even given a complementary beverage. Sadly, it was not a Cosmo, but a liter of cranberry juice, mixed with iodine.

When it was time for the scan, my body failed me again-- it took the doctor 4 tries to find a suitable vein. It brought back the shame of my freshman year of college, when I nobly tried to give blood for the Red Cross. Tried being the operative word, since I was unable to fill the bag in a timely manner, due to my sludge-like blood.

That night, I got my diagnosis: a 4mm kidney stone that had already left my right kidney and was en route to my bladder. Hopped up on painkillers, I settled on a name for my stone: Frances. And then I wrote a song about her:

(to the tune of "Alone" by Heart)

I hear the ticking of the clock
I'm lying here, the room's pitch dark
I wonder where you are tonight
I pee, see nothing, and I moan
And the night goes by so very slow
Oh I hope that it will end soon though
My stone

Till now I always got by on my own
I never really knew pain until I met you
My bladder hurts me to the bone
How do I get out my stone?
How do I get out my stone?


As Lincoln predicted, my kidney stone, like our nation's unrest in 1859, did eventually pass. Frances left me on Thursday, June 5th, at approximately 10:00 pm EST. She is currently in a little baggie on my dresser, next to my hairbrush. I'm supposed to bring her in to a lab for analysis. She looks very small and harmless now, and not at all like this:

Those look like earrings I bought at Cooper-Hewitt recently. That's what came up when I typed in "kidney stones ugly" on Google images.

I seem to be back in good health, but if my sciatica starts acting up, I'll be sure to blog about it.

Losing my blog virginity

Dear Diary, er, blog,

I finally did it! Here are some reasons why:

1. Everybody's doing it
2. Since I'm allegedly a writer, I need to get more in the habit of writing
3. This blog name was too perfect
4. I'm a funny bitch

I'll do my best to keep things interesting. Luckily, strange shit tends to happen to me: For instance, today I was befriended by a Downtown Parks employee named Lee, who was missing a few of his bottom teeth and told me he was attracted to me spiritually.

Now, to tie in with the virginity theme, here's a fun little exercise I created based on the current ad campaign for Phantom of the Opera. If you live in NYC, you've undoubtedly seen the bus ads with the rose, the mask, and the tagline "Do you remember your first time?" This seems to equate seeing Phantom for the first time with having sexual intercourse. But just how similar are the two experiences?

Evaluate the following quotations that describe EITHER seeing Phantom for the 1st time or having awkward beginner sex:

"I could only see half his face"

"It was so boring, I almost fell asleep"

"My ass went numb"

"My favorite part was when the chandelier fell"

"It lasted for two-and-a-half hours"

"Everyone told me I would like it"

"He came on my tits"


Not as easy as you thought it would be, eh?

Please join me

Hi!

Please join me here:

Pink and Barbara


Barbara