the little stripper who could...

it seems that it's becoming a pattern every week, that i'm really only home two nights out of every week. and by "home," i mean the apartment for which i work to pay rent and utilities. the apartment in which i house the fucktard kittens-who-are-not-mine. the apartment in which i actually have a reserved parking space in the lot, use the gym and pool facilities, and store my clothes and polyglot "stuff."

yeah, that home.

i think renting a storage unit would be cheaper, since i really lay my head there less often than i lay it elsewhere. but anyway...

last night was designated "friday night out" with a few friends from work. since she is the tacit-crowned party girl of the salon, and since i have the great good fortune of closing the salon on friday nights with her, i usually end up just packing a few things and driving to her place, partying all night long, and then dragging my sorry, whimpering-yet-sated ass to work the next (early) day.

like today. *cough*

so yeah.

i had thought, and packed clothing accordingly, for 80's Night. y'know, club with nothing but kickass 80's music, bottomless sex on the beach and midori sours, and dancing for hours straight and, in my case, watching friends play pool. i can't stand pool. but instead i was surprised by the news we would be going to the strip club down the street from them.

i was down with that.

so we walked (i swear, it was that close) and i ended up watching them play about a half dozen rounds of pool, ate a few baskets of fries, took (stole) a few sips of my friend's white russian, and then went and watched the girls. now, my friends --being that they live two portland blocks from this place-- are known regulars there, and have their favorite girl. and yes, she's actually quite entertaining and engaging. she's outgoing, talkative, and hilarious on stage. so it was fun.

but while eating fries and watching my friend kick her boyfriend's ass at pool (by nothing but lucky shots and pure chance), what do i espy across the room, in the far, dark corner, but a very shapely, thick, rubenesque venus of redheads spinning upside down on the pole.

i swear to you, ladies and gentlefolk, it took my breath away.

"oh my funky gods," i said.

"what?!" she said.

i pointed. "her."

she looked. "you like her?" her tone was neutral, yet interested.

"my gods!" i breathed. "she's gorgeous! she's not like all the other fucking thin-like-rail girls here that i know i'll never live up to. she's thick, but she's beautiful!" and it was true.

she was round and voluptuous in the way that i would imagine the first women of Eden would have been. of-the-earth, with thick ankles adorned in shining, coiling bronze, muscular calves and a torso defined by just-enough muscle to ripple like soft waves against the shore at sunset. i swear i was enchanted. she didn't wear the usual outfits the others wore, but just a simple red dress and no shoes. and lemme tell you, it's harder to walk around with the self-possession, poise, and grace that the others do when their prancing around in five-inch stillettos or platform heels, and you're barefoot.

she pulled it off.

we sat down, and i actually had to wait --patiently-- through three other girls' sets before my flame-haired vulture goddess came onto the stage. and she was friendly, and talkative, and i think i might have been the first person all night to ask her how she was.

"and how are you all tonight?" she asked, doing her little wiggle-dance.

"we're fabulous," my friend said.

"that's great," said the dancer. "y'know, it's always nice to hear that from people."

"and how are you?" i asked, entranced.

she kind of chuffed, a laugh that's not quite a laugh. "you don't wanna be asking me that right now."

of course, my bold friend being what she is, asked point-blank, "so what happened to make tonight not a good night?"

and she told us. long story short, she came in three hours early to work and it wasn't paying off, not to mention two people had already come up to her to tell her she was too heavy to be dancing. imagine! people with enough shit for brains to dare try make a stripper feel ugly. and not just any stripper -- my vulture goddess! when angry, i would bet hard-earned grooming money she sprouts an extra four arms and her skin turns blue when she's angry, just like one of the patronesses of the Menstrual Temple.

i sat and talked with her after her set was done, stars in my eyes. all night long, i couldn't tear my eyes away from her lines. it wasn't even about the stereotypical eye-candy that all women possess; it was about those beautiful lines, the epic poetry of her curves. i asked her how she got such a stunning body, "...because," i said, pointing at my friend across the room, "i've been telling her all night that you are the most beautiful girl in this entire building. you look real, and you're unbelievable on stage. girl, you give me hope," i said.

throughout our conversation, i found out she was 5'3, weighed 185 lbs., and she was as strong as all that to do the things she did freestyle, and enchanting from every angle. it made me realize that, standing at 5'5 and weighing ten pounds less than she did, beauty was actually attainable.

now, everyone can say, until they're blue in the face, all that beauty in the eye of the beholder bullshit, and many types of beauty, and blah blah fucking blah. but the truth of the matter is majority rules, and all i ever see are skinny, anglo-saxon twigs with delicate bone structures, no hips, and bellies as flat as my sex life with *m* was.

i'm mexican. i am all hip, and i have shoulders as broad as some men's. i will never be slim, and i will never be delicate or flat. i have too much rugged mexican terrain and thought the only goddess figure i could aspire to was of the venus of willendorf persuasion. not that there's anything wrong with Her, just that pendulous breasts and an ass that could park a car wasn't exactly what i had in mind when talking about my inner goddess.

not until my dancing vulture goddess showed me --for the first time in my life-- that thick and beautiful really could go together. i'd never seen anyone like her before.

ever.

she gave me so much last night. she said i made her night. i gave her dollar bills. she gave me hope.