The Boxer

Dear Brianna,

I'm lazy. It's my turn to post. Here's a character monologue I wrote for my writing studio. I wish I was in the middle of nowhere today. It's cold. Please read this is a southern accent.


"Tomatoes"

Grandpa always leaves the house and I never know where it is he's off
to. One day I saw him grab a fishin' pole out the garage, so I figured
he was goin' fishin somewheres, probably the lake down the road a
ways, so I ask him wher you goin' Grampa? He never answers me, he just
gets in the truck. He throws his box and his pole in his truck and he
gets in and starts drivin' away. One day I ran after the truck cause I
just wanted to know real bad where he was off to. I thought he was
goin' to the store without me and I love goin' to the store, so I
start runin' down the gravel driveway to catch up with him, and he
sees me in the mirror and he stops his truck so I can catch up with
him. I was gettin' real angry cause I thought he was tryin' to trick
me out of goin' to the store with him and he knew that I needed to get
me some fishin' hooks so I run up to the window to try and get his
attention and he rolls it down and I ask where you off to Grandpa, and
he says I gotta go do somethin. I gotta do this, I gotta do that. He
ain't gotta do nothin' but breathe, and I tell him that, but I never
get nothing but a branch to my hyde if I talk back to him.

I tried smokin' one of them cigars that Grandpa leaves in the ash
tray in the livin' room. It's only a little left so I figured, I
figured that it wouldn't matter too much. Like, he wouldn't miss it or
nothin'. So I took it out of the tray in the livin' room and I went
outside behind the barn. Not like I was hidin' or nothin', but I just
like to be behind the barn. Not because the compost pile is there or
nothin' , cause that smells, but I just like to know that some people
could only see me if they tried real hard. So I put it in my mouth and
there comes Grandma right around the corner, and she sees me puttin'
somethin' in my mouth. She dropped her whole basket of tomatoes right
there in the dirt and they go flyin' everywheres and I just start
laughin' . I start rollin' around on the ground, not in the compost
pile or nothin' cause that smells, but I start rollin' around in the
ground right by there and she comes barrellin' over like I has been
doin' somethin' wrong and she asks me what you been up to boy? And I
tell her nothin' cause I ain't really been up to nothin' and she tells
me I got somethin' in my mouth that shouldn't be there, and I tell her
it's just one of them cigars that Grandpa keeps in the ashtray in the
livin' room. So she gets real upset tellin' me I can't put them in my
mouth because they're dirty and I tell her that I put dirty things in
my mouth all the time and nothin' ain't happened to me yet and she
just stands there and she looks real upset and all so I tell her I'll
stop puttin' dirty things in my mouth if its what she wants. I tell
her I won't put them tomatoes in my mouth later at supper cause
they've been on the ground and they is dirty.

Grandpa put Grandma in the truck one mornin' real early, and I hear
the dogs barkin' so I go outside to see what's goin' on cause the dogs
only bark if somethin is going on or somethin', so I go outside to see
what all the fuss is and Grandpa is putting Grandma in the truck. She
looks real tired or somethin' so I ask them if they're goin' to the
store to wait for it to open and he says for me to go back inside and
he be back later. So he gets in the truck and starts the truck and he
starts to drive down the gravel driveway and I start to run after the
truck cause I wanna know what's goin on. Grandma looks real tired and
I want to know why he won't let her go back in the house. I says to
him it's too early for Grandma to be up cause she's tired and he tells
me to go back in the house before I get a branch to the hyde. My
backside is still sore from the last branch I got so I decide to go
stand on the porch and wait for Grandma and Grandpa to get back so I
can ask 'em where they went. So I sit there and lots of bugs come and
crawl on my feet cause I wasn't wearin' any shoes and I let them for a
while cause I like the colors they have, but after a while they tickle
so I stop 'em and Grandma and Grandpa still ain't back yet and I still
wonderin' where they are so I eat an apple.


Love,
Katie

taggy pants

Dear Brianna,

In hopes of getting on the good side of the Gods, I will respond to your post with five things people may not know about me.

1. I am a secret redneck. I grew up in Baltimore (which has it's fair share of weird ass people) and at my Grandparent's house in the middle of nowhere Pennsylvania (Bedford), both places that fully support redneck activities. I have been hunting (several times), I've been to about five Nascar races (best days of my life), I've been to livestock fairs, World of outlaw races (fucking dirt track car racing, son), I've worked on a farm (short, short time), I learned to drive at age 12, I had my first beer with my parents, I've had to drive an hour just to get to Walmart and then go in only to buy beef jerky, and one of my first crushes had about ten teeth. Nice.

2. I'm a pretty good flute player. I played for nine years and was second chair in high school. I'm awesome.

3. I had MAD buck teeth. And you will never see pictures. Thankfully, my Mother has dental insurance and i got to have braces for five years.

4. I'm extremely close with my cousins, to the point where we are more like brothers and sisters than cousins (i'm an only child). I grew up with these people, and we're all close in age (my best friend/cousin erin is two months older than me). I will do anything for any of them, and they all know it. Awwwwwwww.

5. Since most people ask me this anyway, I will answer it here. The tattoo of a purple ribbon on my left wrist represents general cancer. It' for all four of my grandparents, my aunts, my mother, Gilda Radner (dork, i know), and myself (I had cancer when I was 16. I'm all better now, and you can ask me about it if you're curious). It's nice to look down every day and see something that reminds me what I've been through in my life and also reminds me how lucky I am to be able to follow all my dreams here in New York when there was a time when I might not have been able to. Sometimes, it makes shitty days a lot better to think about that stuff.

Well, now that you know a lot more about me, I'm gonna go hide in my bedroom for a few weeks while this all blows over.

I don't know who to tag. So, um, I'm not gonna do it. Suck my dick.

Love,
Katie :)

I got tagged.

Dear Katie,
I know this is out of order, but the most super duper wonderful Glennis McMurray tagged me, and now I have to fulfill her and the rest of the world's wishes to know more about the mystery that is Brianna Hope Jacobson. Here are five things you might (or might not) know about me.

1) I have been to SIX *N SYNC concerts. I was at the peak of adolescence during the whole teen pop craze, and I was totes on the *N SYNC side of the boy band battle. My favorite member was Chris (the one with the pineapple dreadlock hair) and I threw birthday parties for Justin Timberlake with my best friend Sara every year. Sara and I collected every television appearance *N SYNC made on a set of 10 VHS Tapes in a time before Tivo and You Tube.

2) My name, Brianna, means beautiful creation in Hebrew. It is pronouced Breeee (like the cheese) ahhhhh (like the sound you make after drinking a glass of water) and then na (like na-cho). Sometimes people pronounce the middle syllable wrong, and that secretly bothers me. My dad moved to America from Israel in his mid-twenties, and I am very proud of the heritage that my name holds. So remember guys, it's ahhhh like awesome, not ah like ant.

3) I had my first kiss in my friend's basement while watching Happy Days. It was an episode where the Fonz is hitting on a tennis pro. I know this because the kiss was so bad, and my eyes were wide open, and to this day, I can not watch that show without being utterly mortified.

4) I will admit this because Sarah Silverman has admitted it, which makes it kinda cool. What is IT you ask....well, I'll tell you. I wet the bed for a long time. Like until I was a little too old to be doing it. And what finally made me stop was going to a children's therapist (I was still a child so it was ok, right!?!) and getting this contraption that I had to attach to my underwear at night. If any moisture ever touched it, it would start beeping, and I had to get up and change. I know...Grosstown.

5) I wrote a rough draft of my Myspace page. Before I took the plunge into posting a profile for myself on the interweb, I did what any other self-respecting, OCD, writer-type would do, I sat down with my journal. While listening to Neutral Milk Hotel, I wrote a down right pretentious, embarrassing, profile, that made me look like the most annoying hipster that ever hipped (so not me), and by the time I actually posted said profile, it looked nothing like the word vomit I had originally wrote out.

So there it is, Miss Cheek, (and Miss McMurray). Now here are the peeps I am tagging...

The beautiful and talented Ari Scott

My Saturday night homie Brian Kennedy

The refreshingly honest Anna Rubanova

The really good hugger DC Pierson

and....YOU! Miss Katie Cheek

So that's that. Thanks Glennis!
Love,
Brianna