Day 55 - Inanimate Object Whisperer

October 2nd, 2009

In 7th grade, we had a creative writing assignment and one of my classmates wrote something that inspired a response in me that went something like, “Damn, I wish I wrote that.” His essay was from the perspective of a carved pumpkin sitting on a suburban porch on Halloween night. The orange gourd-like squash was making observations of all that crossed his path. It all started off so innocently. “Look at these precious children in pirate and superhero costumes.” Then the rising action kicked in. “Wow, these kids seem too old to be trick-or-treating. Why do they have rolls of white paper that they’re throwing into the trees? It’s beautiful!” Then in the final climatic scene, Pumpkin says, “That’s strange. One of these egg throwing toilet paper hurling teens is approaching me. Why are you picking me up? Don’t throw me. No. No. Noooooooooo!” Splat.

As humans, we spend an exorbitant amount of time, money and energy self reflecting and dissecting our ever changing emotions. Unfortunately, inanimate objects are expected to hold in their innermost feelings as if they’re with their family celebrating an awkward waspy Connecticut Christmas. One time in an improv show, we ended up playing items in a purse. I was the only girl so I played the tampon. Obviously. There was something liberating and philanthropic about giving these objects a voice. Soon after this, my HP computer ( his name is Esteban) spoke to me. He had 3 messages. “Don’t type on me so hard. I’m fragile. Like a delicate flower. Secondly, you really need to get Norton AntiVirus. Seriously Jax, don’t be an imbecile." Finally, Esteban said that I must act as a conduit for objects that lack the quality of being alive.

I owed it to myself, to my laptop and to inquiring minds to go upon this journey. Immediately, I started hearing the voices. It was as if I just needed permission to enter the inanimate world . Interesting note, my boobs were the first to reach out to me. They introduced themselves as Mommy 1 and Mommy 2. Both of them really laid into me. “Please, enough with those Victoria Secret Bras. Sure, they have a certain allure..but their lasting power is for shit.” Also, show us off more..we need to breath. It’s getting colder and you’re going to start hiding us behind Performance Fleece. He’s a dick.” Clearly their complaints struck a chord with me because I ended up writing Day 5- Unintentional Cleavage [LINK REMOVED]. The overall message being that letting the ladies out will result with life working for us rather than against us.

I grabbed a bottle of Evian water and went upon my purposeful research. Immediately, the plastic bottle spoke to me. “ Jax, keep drinking my overpriced goodness but this whole ‘I’m from the natural spring’s of Lake Geneva' is bullshit. I was bottled from a toilet at a Shell Gas station off Highway 46 near Denville, New Jersey." Sadly, that revelation made me vomit for the majority of the day. This project was intense and I needed to baby step my way into my calling.

After I had ejected all contents from my stomach from the past year, I decided it would be most logical to hit a sports themed Mexican bar. The voices ran rampant. There seemed to be a lot of jealousies and rivalries among things without heartbeats. The mild salsa felt inferior to the hot salsa, the 150 watt light bulb constantly condescended the 75 watt and the well liquor compared their segregation from the top shelf spirits to America’s race relations in the early 60’s.

Wheel of Fortune was on TV and all of a sudden 14 letters from the alphabet started a rumble with the 12 most common letters: E, T, A, O, I, N, S, H, R, D, L and U. The slighted letters finally backed off, told Pat and Vanna their lack of use was a breach of contract and left in a huff to join Dave Chappelle in South Africa.

I had suffered angry inanimate object overload and needed to end my day’s work and returned home to Esteban(who I’m beginning to think might have questionable connections to the Spanish mafia.) Regardless, He was really proud of me and said that if he had a hand he would pat me on the back . My vocal computer had one final message that he needed me to pass along to all Apple Computers. “I’ve been talking with all the PC’s and we have some issues with you holier than thou Apples.” I told him that I would be happy to relay his message as I see most of them at my local coffee shop down the street. “Please let the motherfuckers know that we are sick of their self righteous, user friendly ways and awesome, dare I say kick ass, graphics. Also, please give the Power Macintosh G3 my number because she’s smokin’ hot.”