Tell the truth dammit!

Truth search

It’s cold! It’s finally cold outside! Open up the windows! Swing open the French doors! Rattlesnakes be damned! I feel invincible. I can actually breathe again. I needed a sweatshirt this morning to walk with the dogs. Nothing can bring me down.

I love the desert in fall. I love the desert in winter. I love the desert until about April. And then I don’t. Then it turns into a hellish furnace that sucks the life out of me, my family and everything around us. Let’s be honest, April, May, June, July, August, September…that’s six whole months. When I first moved here, people systematically perpetuated the three month conspiracy theory. It went something like this, “Oh, you’ll love living here. The weather is perfect 9 months of the year. Then it gets a little hot. But you get used to it. Besides, it’s a dry heat.” OK, let’s look at this fabrication. No matter how you slice it, it gets unbearably hot in April and stays over 100 degrees well into October. Unless my math is frightfully mistaken, that only leaves 50% of the year where people can reasonably function outdoors.

So why does everyone lie about this? Why not just be honest and tell newcomers, “Here’s the thing, you’ll probably want to kill yourself by the time July rolls around. That’s totally normal. Everyone feels that way. But try to hang in there. October isn’t all that far off.” I would have been much better prepared to face the fiery reality if someone somewhere had told me what to expect.

It’s just like pregnancy. Nobody tells you that you’re gonna have unbearable acid reflux for 9 months, projectile vomit in the car on your way to prenatal yoga, and think seriously about downing an entire bottle of Vicodin at least three times a day to put yourself out of your misery. Instead, books like “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” describe pregnancy’s healthy glow and emotional euphoria. Come on. Wouldn’t it be better to fess up to the ugly reality awaiting expectant mommies than to set them up for failure by making them feel isolated, detached and forsaken?

We lie about everything! We tell people they look great when they look like crap. We swear up and down that we’re not angry when we’re literally fuming inside. We tell our kids that a big, jolly fat man is gonna come down the chimney on Christmas Eve and leave loads of presents for them. Why do we do this? Is reality truly that bleak?

What would life look like if we just started telling the truth?

“Sorry, Junior. No presents this Christmas. The economy’s in the toilet and we’re barely able to put food on the table. Now go do your homework.”

“You don’t really look fat in those jeans. But you do kind of resemble a sausage that’s been over-stuffed into too small of a skin. Maybe trousers would serve you better.”

“Wow, you must have spent a small fortune to decorate your house and make it look exactly the same as every other ‘contemporary’ Southwestern abode in the neighborhood. So much for individuality.”

I actually crave the opportunity to tell someone the truth. But no one wants to hear it. It’s too mean, too hurtful. We’re programmed to sugar-coat reality. Especially out here in the West. I remember when I first moved to California and everyone was so nice to me all the time. They’d promise me things to my face that would never come to fruition and say things behind my back that were completely opposed to what they’d sworn in a face to face encounter. I got into the habit of brazenly cutting people off mid compliment. “Look, I’m from Chicago,” I’d sneer, “Just tell me the truth.”

I’d like to tell you that I’m gonna go forth honestly from this point forward, that I’m gonna turn over a new leaf, that I’m committed to speak my mind, voice my inner truth, and stop perpetuating the falsehoods that abound. But I can’t. Because that would be…a lie.

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What would you do for $33,000

Ms. Hawkenson, proudly showing her ASU student ID card.

Granted, nobody wants their 18 year old daughter having live sex on camera in exchange for $2000. But, honestly, is it that big a deal?

The news sources have landed on this loopy tale about Elizabeth Hawkenson, the ASU geology student, who appeared in a video for the porn Web site Backroom Casting Couch and allegedly lost her $33,000 ASU scholarship.

Well, first of all, the whole kerfuffle about the scholarship is a hoax. Apparently there was no irate alumnus who wrote to the board of regents insisting the scholarship be revoked. The video itself; however, does exist. Ms. Hawkenson, finding herself a few thousand dollars short of tuition, (and apparently a few cards short of a full deck), made the unwise decision to appear in a “reality porn” video about a young student who innocently ends up copulating for a promise of 5 grand that never materializes. The “reality” is that Ms. Hawkenson knew exactly what she was doing and chose to have sex on camera supposedly believing that the tape’s distribution would be limited to pay per view websites.

Okay, naivete is one thing. But let’s examine the idiocy of this young woman’s choices. First of all, no matter what part of Texas you’re from, you ought to know that sex videos go viral. And if not right away, 20 years later when you actually have a family, career or husband who might really be humiliated by them. Sex on camera, nude photos, and compromising voice-mail messages all fall into the category of idiotic mistakes that even a country rube just off the turnip truck shouldn’t make. Can you say “Dr. Laura?” But there’s an even more asinine choice that Ms. Hawkenson made and that one really baffles me. At one point in the video, she proudly displays her drivers license and ASU student ID card. I’m sorry. But that takes the cake for stupidity. I mean, if you’re gonna have sex with strangers for money, at least pretend you’re from U of A, or Oregon, or USC for that matter.

Now I actually get that people sometimes do foolish things when finances are waining. I, for one, remember a time, eons ago, when a starving actor in Chicago, posed nude for a high class shoe advertisement that turned out, luckily enough, to only expose the scaly skin of a pair of crocodile leather Jimmy Choo stilettos. I was fortunate. A lot of young women aren’t.

Ms. Hawkenson is quoted in several articles saying that her dorm life has become treacherous since the viral video hit the web. No kidding. It’s gotta be rough fielding all those late night “study” invitations she’s no doubt been receiving. But what did she expect? If you’re gonna have sex on camera, you need to realize that someone is going to see that. That’s the whole bloody point of it, you dodo. I mean, they’re not capturing the act on film in order to bury it in the backyard.

I’m glad Ms. Hawkenson didn’t lose her ASU scholarship on account of her poor choices. I can even argue that it’s partly her parents fault for not finding the cash to fund tuition. She did what she had to do to make some much needed dinero. If she’d founded an internet start-up, we’d all be praising her independence and entrepreneurial spirit.

But instead, she used her God given gifts to up her bottom line (if you’ll excuse the expression). And that, my friends, is considered a no-no in our culture. But perhaps we all ought to just drop the “holier than thou” attitude and look within to see how we may have contributed to this sad scene of juvenile delinquency

Maybe there aren’t enough legitimate work-study options at ASU. Maybe sky-rocketing tuition costs for out-of-staters need to be re-evaluated. Or maybe, we all need to step back and stop reveling in the juicy details of this poor woman’s misfortune and focus on earning a few extra bucks ourselves, so that by the time our kids need to pay tuition, we’ll actually be able to cover it. I mean, given the choice, wouldn’t you rather spend a few extra years with your nose to the grindstone, so that your poverty stricken youth don’t end up hocking their wares in today’s equivalent of the world’s oldest profession?

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Your tax dollars at work!

Okay, what is wrong with this picture? Our State is literally going broke. We don’t have enough space to house the criminal offenders we have. Our law enforcement officers are radically understaffed because of funding issues. Our courts our ridiculously overcrowded. And yet, there’s enough manpower, money and chutzpah to send an official “officer of the court” to my private residence at 8:30 at night (on a school night) to serve me f-ing papers for a traffic camera ticket I received in July. I have to ask, could we possibly put our resources to better use?

So I’ve finally gotten my five-year-old to bed and am tucking in my 9-year-old when the doorbell rings. This is odd since we live in a gated community and never received a call from the guard gate that someone was here for us. We live in a very anti-social neighborhood (don’t get me started) and only know a few of our neighbors, none of whom randomly show up at odd hours of the night to borrow a cup of sugar or ask for help with a run-away pooch. I run to the door and ask the obligatory “Who is it?”

No answer.

Now any sane individual wouldn’t open the door at this point. But I guess I figured it was some poor, lost mute looking for aid and I swung the door open with total abandon. There stood this scramble-haired, gen-Y kid in jeans and a skater-looking t-shirt. “Um…Are you Debra?” he asked. Suddenly my senses returned and I realized this probably wasn’t the Publisher’s Clearing House here to deliver my 10 million dollar prize. In the meantime, my little guy, who was jarred awake by the doorbell, is now screaming frantically for me to come to him, and my older son is anxiously shivering in a towel in his doorway.

“No,” I said with the conviction of a well trained perjurer. “Why?”

“I have to…um…serve these papers to…um…Debra.” he clumsily announced.

“Well, she’s not here,” I continued with the fabrication. “Do you want me to give them to her?” (Now, let me note here that I thought in order for papers to be properly served they had to go to the individual named in said papers.)

“That’d be great,” he said handing me the papers. He turned to leave and then looked back. “By the way, what was your name?”

“Um…Diane,” I said, “I’m the baby sitter.”

“Uh huh,” he smiled as if to let me know he wasn’t fooled by my inane charade.

I closed the door and immediately opened the letter It was a photo-radar ticket from July. “You have got to be kidding,” I muttered with incredulity, adding a few choice words along the way. “What the hell is wrong with these people? Aren’t there real criminals they could go after? I mean, what are they gonna do, put me in jail?” My nine-year-old is now sobbing uncontrollably. I run to him and pull him close. “Honey, what’s wrong? Why are you crying?”

“I don’t want mommy to go to jail,” he wimpered.

“Mommy isn’t going to jail, sweetie. This is nothing. Please don’t worry,” I reassured him.

I finally managed to settle my children, calm their fears and get them to bed. But it was already after 9 and I knew that the next day was bound to be a tough one since they usually go to bed well before 8.

The ticket is for $220. I don’t deny that the ticket was deserved, or that the hideous photo is actually me. But can anyone tell me why they needed to come to my house at 8:30 at night, disrupt my children’s routine, and waste an abundance of time, energy and resources for something as insignificant as a four-month old speeding ticket?

Maybe I should send this to Sheriff Joe. He’s a sensible guy. I bet he’d go after the idiot beurocrats who sent the scraggly kid to my doorstep to terrorize my children and annoy the hell out of me. Hmmm….maybe he’ll help me if I tell him that kid was an illegal?