Days Gone By- Chapter 1

Chapter 1 of "Exit, Stage Left"

Diving in. My mind is set. I'm focused. The doors are open. I've prepared. I'm ready. "Let's do this!" I say to myself, as I step toward the closet. I absolutely can't put it off any longer. My closet has needed a purge & clean for the last 6 months. I made it my mission when I moved into this apartment, 2 years ago, that I would do my best to keep things uncluttered, and Oh, how I've slacked. Take this shirt, for instance. It's "coral" coloured. I thought it looked more like orange when I bought it. Got it home, tried it on with my jeans, and realised I looked like a Katy Perry wanna-be. I've always found myself sticking with either white, or dark shirts. It's easier on laundry day to separate things. Not that I'm sooooo busy, but any little time saver helps. I don't know what I was thinking when I bought that shirt, but I haven't worn it once, so it's going in the bag to donate. Christ, the pricetags are still on it. Here's another shirt, one my mother bought me. It has a "boat neck" and thin, blue & white pin stripes. Great for a day in France, eating cheese and crepes, but not so good for upstate New York in little-known town of White Hill. In the donate bag it went. Oh, great. A sweater that's not even mine. This is what I get for having a run of one-night stands, a while back. As I inspect the sweater, check the size and take a sniff, I sit on my bed, thinking about the last woman I had over, and for the life of me, I can't remember much about it. I do, however, remember that we met at a fundraiser for.....Ok, well, anyways, I had one of those stupid, sticker name tags on. I had scribbled my name, "Dina" so poorly that this woman, approached me and said, "Dino? Like the Flintstone's pet?" I looked at my tag, and said, "No, that's an "a", not an "o"...." She then got it wrong again, by saying, "Oh! My mistake! Hello, Dinah...." By this time, I had just finished my 5th plastic cup of wine, and said, "It's Deeeeeeeena, nice to meet you, Jockie." She then looked at her own name tag, and said..."It's Jackie." Somehow, from that twisted introduction, we ended up making out in a janitor closet during the silent auction announcements and the next thing you know, I was rolling over in my bed the following morning, regretting all of it, as usual.

I should explain, I'm not a total w***e. I did things like a traditional, Italian American girl for most of my life. I was the pride & joy of my Mom & Dad. The only child, good at sports, decent in school, close with my whole family, never had to be brought home by the police, never had another parent call mine with "concerns", never got into too much trouble, even in my angsty teen years. I was your average everyday teenager- obsessed with Don Johnson and "MIami Vice", hated walking to the school bus stop, couldn't buy enough Lip Smacker Dr. Pepper Lipgloss, or enough cassette tapes of Prince and Paula Abdul and I skipped classes to make it home in time to watch "Days of Our Lives" a lot.

My Dad passed away when I was 19 years old, from a rare form of cancer. It seems like a life time ago, and yet feels like yesterday. It's been almost 15 years. My mother and I have always been really close. Almost like "The Gilmore Girls" but without the annoying incessant fast-paced chatter. I lived with my mother until I was 24 years old and it wasn't weird in any way, like when a geeky guy does it. He's either a total Momma's Boy or a some pervert that lives in the basement and surfs porn & plays video games until his Mom calls him upstairs for dinner. No, this was a very cool arrangement, like two chic friends rooming together. I worked in my mother's restaurant all of my teen years, and even into my twenties. My cousins and friends from school did, too. The restaurant was in the only mall in the whole area, and it was like living the dream at 17 years old, to be at the epi-center of all things cool ALL the time. I would meet my friends at The Gap, or at the smoothie kiosk on my breaks, and never, ever got tired of hearing, "Oh my God, Dina, you are SO lucky!"

I got a tad bit restless after my father passed away, and felt this massive creative surge within myself, which prompted me to go head-strong into theatre. No one saw that coming! I got a job at a small, local theatre in the downtown area when I was 22 and started doing everything from stage managing, to props, sets, even directing summer productions and pulling shifts in the box office. The pay was decent, I made tons of new friends and I was being exposed to all sorts of things that never crossed my path in White Hill...like gay people. I mean, the theatre was only 20 minutes away, in Rockway City, but it felt like I was working in Manhattan, the way it hustled and bustled. The gay men were always so busy, running off to shop, do lunch, meet for a latte, hit the gym, take in a movie, checking out the new stock at Crate & Barrel or picking up their poodles from the groomer.

I had a gay cousin, Brad, who was much older than me. He was a hair stylist (not just any hair stylist, he was Lola Falana's hair stylist!) and he lived in Las Vegas. I don't think I knew what gay meant until I was about 14 or so, and can't remember anyone really explaining it to me, so I'm not sure how I figured it out. I just knew when Brad would come into town, it felt like Christmas Day every day, complete with twinkle lights, and tinsel. He would bring the best gifts, and would cut & style everyone's hair. He smoked cigarettes at my kitchen table and he and my mother would talk about clothes, and fashion and his boyfriends. When he would leave to go back to Vegas, it felt like someone painted the sky grey. I never questioned it, but in hindsight, I wonder if he lived there because being gay in White Hill was probably difficult in the late 70's & early 80's. It was just never really discussed. Especially after the whole Aids scare, with "And the Band Played On.." I remember asking my Mom if Brad was going to die. She just said, "Not every gay person will get Aids, Dina. Brad is going to be fine." I think, subconsciously, I worried about Brad, thanks to "An Early Frost" a made-for-TV movie starring Kate Jackson and Harry Hamlin. It eased up, though, as I got older and there was less Aids controversy, and more focus on how trendy this "gay thing" was becoming. In no time at all "Will & Grace" was all the rage, and everyone wanted a gay boy best friend. I was ahead of the game- it was "Oh my God, DIna, you are SO lucky"- all over again because I had my share of gay boys surrounding me now. I even went so far as to have my first girl on girl experience, because I thought, "What the hell!" It came about rather quickly. My friend, Leslie, who ran the box office, and her sister, Megan, had a Halloween party, where everyone got a little s**t-faced. Megan suggested a late night game of spin-the-bottle, with only 2 gay boys and 3 girls left, it ended up being a lot of girl-girl kissing, basically. The gays left rather quickly, Leslie went to bed, and that left me & Megan alone, going a step at a time further, and further until before you know it we had rubbed out a few orgasms in a steamy make out, dry humping session on the floor of Megan's bedroom. I was perfectly okay with it, thinking I was now "worldly".

So, life in the theatre had opened my eyes to some seriously edgy fun. After weekend shows, a bunch of us would go to the bar around the corner and drink, eat, play pool, and dance until last call. This is where I met Billy, my future ex-husband. He was loaded up on Jaeger Bombs, and very graciously allowed me to kick his a*s at pool, then asked for my phone number. He said he liked my voice. "You have that sexy, raspy, gravelly....thing...going on," he said, as he put his jacket on one arm and one arm only. Before he left, he kissed my chin, in a drunken wobble, that may or may not have been meant for my lips. His buddies took him away, and I instantly turned to our leading lady in "Butterflies Are Free" and said, "I think I just met my husband."

So, I was married at 26, two years after that sloppy chin kiss. Billy's family owned a chain of busy hardware stores. Billy ran the one a minute away from the theatre. His brother, Richie, ran the other store near White Hill and his parents ran the "mega-store" a few miles away. Our families got along wonderfully. My mother had been dating a nice guy, Frank, who was the new maintenance supervisor at the mall. They got along great, and I was really happy for my Mom. Our wedding was perfect. We bought a house on the outskirt of White Hill near Rockway City, so we were minutes from our families and work places. We had been fixing it up for a year, and actually moved in on our wedding night. Billy had his friend sneak into the house during the reception and light candles and put flowers everywhere. It was the dream package. Billy and I were like two peas in a pod. Best friends who were lucky enough to be married. We were very comfortable with one another, very fast. Billy is the first guy I ever let fart in front of me. If you knew me, you would know, that is huge. I mean, hey, it was just me and my Mom for a really long time, and we NEVER farted in front of each other! But Billy was like a giant kid. He had dimples, messy hair, and was always smiling. He had an adorable face and kind of a Boo-Boo Bear, chubby body so what I'm saying is Billly could get away with anything, even farting. Everyone loved Billy, including me. So, what happened next was a bit of a shock.

I can't really describe the chain of events over the next three years, but needless to say, that night with Megan replayed in mind often. I confided in Billy, who thought it was totally hot, of course. He was so delighted about it, he began buying and downloading girl on girl porn for me. We would watch a few videos, get all worked up, have sex and Billy would fall asleep moments later. I would end up surfing the internet for lesbian chat rooms, and having girl-girl cyber sex with complete strangers until dawn.

It was fun for a while, but then it got to be really distracting. I felt like it was intruding on my thoughts all the time. I kept picturing myself with women.....and I liked it. I couldn't walk by another woman without wondering what it would be like to sleep with her. I couldn't watch TV without thinking how badly I wanted to kiss Leah Remini from "King of Queens". Billy must have sensed it because he was forever suggesting we have a threesome with Megan. I completely shot down the idea, much to his dismay. It got so bad that I found myself in chair, across from a therapist for weekly sessions.

A few grand later, I had concluded I was a lesbian. My therapist was a wonderful woman, who looked exactly like Rhea Pearlman (Carla, from "Cheers") but had the most soothing personality. She convinced me that bringing Billy with me to therapy might help in my "coming out" to him. She was right, and that was how Billy and I got through my revelation. We had tears, and tantrums, we were both scared of what the future would hold. I had guilt because he was sad. But as sad as Billy was, he never wavered in his support of my conclusion. Over the next year and a half, Billy and I lived together in the same house. I moved into the guest room. We lived like college roommates. Billy had now become the one trolling the internet chat rooms and having cyber sex with strange women all night long. We knew we had to tell our families what was happening. We had put it off long enough. We were still attending family functions, still saw each other at work all the time. I was forever in the hardware store, getting stuff for the sets, and Billy was always helping, delivering material for us, or attending shows. Not much had changed, aside from me sleeping with women and Billy having an online affairs left and right.

I had slowly been dipping my toe in the lesbian dating pool with the help of my gay friends from the theatre. Billy was spending a lot of time oniine with a woman from Montana. We were transitioning into friends, and it was going smoothly. We confided in each other, our fears about the new people in our lives, our insecurities, and how we were going to drop this bomb on our families. I decided that I would tell my mother first. Billy came with me. My mother was shocked. She handled it like a trooper but I could see her hopes and dreams for me dashing away in her eyes. Having Billy with me was a major help. He often chimed in and would try and take some heat off me by saying that he was "fine" and explaining that "we've had a while to adjust and we know you need time to do the same," which would get us out of there when we were ready to bolt. His parents, who are a lot more old school than my mother, handled things rather well. His mother even said, "I kinda thought maybe you were gay because you never wore heels, or dresses..." So, all in all...it took a while to process, for everyone, and to move onto the next phases of our lives.

Billy and I divorced the following year and his Montana chick moved to White Hill and in with him. Her name is Hannah, ironically, and she came with a six year old son, Daniel. Hannah slipped into in my spot without skipping a beat. We were fast friends, and she seemed to really care about Billy. I loved Billy..but like a brother, so I was happy that he found someone to love him the way he needed and deserved to be loved. Our families were still close. Richie was a little weird about it all at first, stubbornly boycotting barbecues because I was going to be there. He thought it was disrespectful to Hannah. After many long conversations with Billy and Hannah AND myself, we finally convinced Richie to quit acting like a douchebag. Hannah and I were perfectly fine about everything and so was Billy. Our parents made the best of this "ultra modern" decision to remain close, and everyone was adjusting because the bottom line was I was happy and Billy was happy. We talked almost every day, he would bring Hannah & Danny to the theatre, which I was now pretty much running now. I still dropped tickets off for his mother, she still donates things like baskets & books and chatzkies to our art department, and my mother still hosts holidays and a rockin' pool party every Memorial Day for all of us. I knew I had thrown everyone into a tailspin for a while, but over time, we had adjusted.

In fact, just this past May, I actually sat back, opened a beer looked around at everyone, enjoying themselves at my mother's- Billy, Hannah, Danny, Billy parents, even Richie, and I thought to myself, "We made it through, and we're all okay."

Life is good. I can't complain. Well, other than having an overloaded, bulging closet, I can't complain. I love my apartment. I love my job. But, I do feel like because I didn't figure things out until I was 28 or so, that I was a "late bloomer" and I hated this term, because it means "inexperienced", really. Even though I was. My first few years of being "out", were like making up for lost time. I was f*****g everything in my path. I was getting tang from every where I could. If it wasn't the local lesbian bar, it was from some online hook up, and if that wasn't enough, I could still swing a set-up by one of my gay boys, who always knew a lezzie that was up for "dinner & a show".

I toss Jackie's sweater into the donate bag. I can't imagine I'll be seeing her again. It's been like...I don't know...four months. I didn't get a phone number or anything. I know it sounds mean to donate someone else's sweater without checking with them, but it brings me back to that morning when I woke up, full of regret, and feeling awful that I was such a bad lesbian. Most people know lesbians usually move quickly with their feelings so a one night stand could possibly be a stepping stone to a co-habitating long term ticket to "Nester-ville" and I wasn't having ANY of that. I had to make up for lost time, remember?! All that changed after Jackie left (which couldn't have been fast enough for me). I wandered around my apartment, feeling like a "user" for the first time. I don't know why, I don't know what caused it, but I know it had nothing to do with Jackie, the person, who had just left. It was me, the person who was still there. I wanted, for once, to wake up with someone I cared about, talk, laugh,maybe even make breakfast together, and... all that stuff I was starting miss. I made a mental note that day: "Quit being an a*****e." But, old habits die hard and I was back to the easy ride of the one night stands. Get in, get out, no mess. I'm just not a good sharer- not with my bed, not with my shower, and not with my feelings.

I'm sure being a director, having my name in the paper for sold out shows, interviews, and having the first ever LGBT plays being put on in Rockway was certainly helping in the poon department.

It wasn't because I was some knock out in the looks department. In fact, I would describe myself as pretty average. I have a decent smile, I could make twinkly eyes easily, I have full lips (thank God!) and I've been told by the girl who does my waxing that my eyebrows have "the perfect arch". Oh, and I have good hair. I'm Italian, what do you expect? Other than that- it's your basic brown eyes, brown hair look that doesn't really stand out in a crowd. I'm 34 years old and could maybe pass for 30 on a good day. I have a few extra pounds because I eat s**t food all the time and although I'm on the "go" a lot, I don't really get any formal exercise. I'm probably obese by Hollywood's standard, but for White Hill, NY, I'm normal. Like, say along the lines of..Lena Dunham, from HBO's "Girls", and that's okay, because I'm way taller than her and I have much better eyebrows.

That brings me to these jeans I'm holding. They were relegated to the top shelf for a reason. Oh, I remember. I feel like I have to suck in my stomach all day when I wear these. I skip lunch because I don't want to feel uncomfortable, and then trick myself into thinking I feel thinner, even though I'm dizzy and light headed from not eating. Yep..into the donate bag these pants go.

My work schedule is as crazy as I make it. Most of the time after a show is up & running, I don't have to be there for every performance. So, I do get some free time. What I do with that free time is questionable. I was on a Bravo TV bender for a while, hoplessly addicted to those mind-numbing "Real Housewives" shows, but I decided that my clutter-free commitment was dropping off slowly especially where my closet was concerned and I became diligent in my quest to get it cleaned today. The bigger picture is that I'm doing something useful with a day off.

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