Craigslist

I'm addicted to Craigslist Missed Connections.  I troll them all the time, for people all over the country. I tell myself that it's for an as-yet-unstarted fiction project, but really, reading about people who meet and lose soul mates at Exxon stations kind of gives me my jollies. 

To me, a missed lie is like a Missed Connection.  The woulda-shoulda-coulda eats away at me, until I just have to tell someone my brilliant, fun story, so I wind up... lying about lying. 

When I do that, the lie takes a frame form, like, "You won't believe the ridiculous lie I told my patient!!! I told her about how my mom always told us to take off our socks when we were indoors, so that our feet could grow naturally.  And then, sorry, Mom, I told her that you would get all counter-intuitive, and  make me wear pointe shoes every night, so that when I went to ballet class, being en pointe was more natural than being on flat feet. But don't worry, I shaped it so it sounded like the world's best parenting, like maybe I grew up to be in San Francisco ballet, but quit because I found my calling in hospital administration. She believed me; we talked about stage mothers and show choir for like an hour." 

It's like once-removed lying.  Or a double lie.  It needs a name-- I'm open to suggestions. For now, I'm calling it a Missed Connection lie.  A Craigslist lie, maybe? 

Maybe I am a lying addict, if I have to tell Missed Connection lies.  Or maybe it's just really, really fun and kills boredom better than online Scrabble.

No matter.  The point: I sat down to blog tonight, with every intention of telling a Craigslist lie.  Then I realized, Craigslist lying is probably still lying, even under my loose definition. 

So... I'm going to abstain.  I'm not going to tell the story of how I told a stranger in the park that my dog is playing Toto in an upcoming national tour of the Wizard of Oz. I'm not going to elaborate by describing the woman's awed facial expressions, or how I relayed, in painstaking detail, a stage dog's training schedule. 

Apparently, stage mothering is the lying theme of the day. 

And because I deprived the world of a new lie, I'm going exorcise one of my past Grand Retellings, that just so happens to keep with today's motif.  

In second grade, my friend Brittany (name not changed, because in all honesty, I'm not sure if she's even alive anymore) and I decided to sing "I Enjoy Being a Girl" from Flower Drum Song for the spring talent show.   We made costumes, wrote choreography, and rehearsed enough to put a Mouseketeer to shame. We'd convinced ourselves that whatever deity had brought us the Olsen twins was probably lurking in the audience, just waiting to grant us our own Nickelodeon show.  We were ready.

Opening night finally arrived.  We were slated to perform third, after the Swan sisters sang an Olsen Twins song (this was a dark period of the 1990's).  We got onstage, the music started, we heard our cue, and... the CD started skipping.  And then it died.  Brittany ran offstage, but I, ever the consummate professional, gamely performed the song a Capella. 

Unfortunately, without the musical cues and choreography, I wasn't sure how to exit gracefully.  So, in order to cover while I came up with a way to exit stage left, I kept singing.  I smoothly transitioned from Flower Drum Song  to Les Miserables to Annie Get Your Gun (Broadway repertoire courtesy of my mother).  Just as I was really gathering steam, I launched into an exuberant rendition of "Let Me Entertain You" from Gypsy, which, as it turns out, was deemed inappropriate for elementary audiences, and a PTA mom gave me the proverbial hook (it was actually a foam Noodle from the pool, which she used as a poker device). 

Usually, when I close this story, I tell people that a talent agent was sitting in the audience, who felt that stripper musicals were entirely appropriate for eight-year-olds, and cast me in a Gypsy national tour.  Or, if I'm feeling morose that day, I use the entire anecdote as a backdrop for my adult-onset tone deafness.

Today, I feel perky.  Today, I was in the touring company.  And maybe, after the tour closed, I booked a guest spot on My So-Called Life.
 
Maybe.