Rocky Four

Today I have a guest post from my lovely wife, describing a recent outing we had with some friends of hers to see Rocky Horror: The Musical at the Ordway Theater in Saint Paul:

This past Saturday (October 27) Beth and I went to aerobics (as we usually do) and then to her favorite antique store (as we often do). The owner of the shop knows Beth (and me too I guess) fairly well. I imagine that he assumes I am her closeted lesbian partner because of my successful encouragement of her frequent and large purchases (this Saturday he said “your paycheck is in the mail”) and frequent presence when he later delivers these purchases.

I was not there when he delivered the antique sofa this time, however. (I am a Grinch about Halloween this year, largely due to the failure to be invited to any parties and disinterest in hosting one.) My absence was because—while they were not Halloween plans per se—we had plans nonetheless. In fact, I had told the antique shop owner about these plans. He had been chatting with us about the party he was going to that night. I shared that I wasn’t invited to any parties and was sad, but that at least I had some fun plans—I would be seeing Rocky Horror that night! After an awkward few exchanges, it became clear that he thought I said Rocky Four. As if I wasn’t pathetic enough! He said, sarcastically, “Yes, you’ve got plans!”.

So the plan was to see Rocky Horror on stage with my best high school friends. (Who came over first for dinner, necessitating the absence from the sofa delivery.) In high school, we often went to see the movie on Saturday nights (Sunday mornings, really as the movie was at midnight) at the Uptown Theater in Minneapolis. After the show, it was important to show up at the Uptown Embers and hopefully see some cool kids who’d been at the movie. (We were not so much cool kids ourselves, but trying.) Our parents did not like these outings.

Anyway, we began the evening much more subdued this past Saturday night. My friends showed up dressed nicely for a night out at the theater in sweaters and skirts. Michael was also dressed nicely for a night at the theater with a sport jacket—I had told him that his outfit wasn’t quite right but, in fairness, didn’t really offer any alternatives or explanation. During dinner, Heidi helped me pick out a different outfit. The silver pants were too tight (but funny to show off). The black satin tuxedo pants and inappropriately low cut blouse (which disappeared under my black and bone zebra print trench coat) worked in the end.

At the show, many other attendees were dressed just like my friends and Michael – nice conservative dressed up blouses and skirts, slacks and shirts, and so on. A few attendees could have been on stage themselves – one man right behind us had the requisite bustier, fishnets, and stilettos. Perhaps after I again lamented our lame outfits, Michael said again how I had failed to give appropriate guidance. I said he could easily dress like “Brad” right then and there. Dressing like Brad at that point in the show required an undershirt, stuffed briefs, and knee-socks held up with garters. Michael started to disrobe to scare me, and, perhaps to his surprise, I didn’t stop him. He was wearing boxers rather than briefs, they didn’t appear to be stuffed, and his socks stayed up without garters, but it was still a pretty good impression. (He later expressed some relief that his fly on those particular boxers also had an extra snap.) Heidi was inspired too (after some encouragement) and took off her shirt, so she looked much like “Janet” in her bra and slip. (I think Heidi must not have worn a slip and thus kept her skirt on.)

It is true that I didn't think Katie would call my bluff. I have a very high threshold for embarrassment, and I use this to my advantage to unnerve others (perhaps reminiscent of Andy Kaufman). In fact, I wasn't expressing relief but rather regret that my Brad outfit turned out as tame as it was.

Even though I lack any semblance of modesty, I do have at least some empathy. One time in college, I dressed rather revealingly in a Speedo at Epsilon Theta's annual Halloween party. Each pledge class was supposed to dress in a theme, and ours decided to come as various computer programming languages. As we were brainstorming ideas (coming as a sailor to represent "sea" for C++, for example) we found we were a little short on commonly known languages. Stephanie (who came as Daffy Duck to represent LISP) mentioned that there's an obscure engineering language called G code. "Perfect!" I thought. "I'll just wear a G string to represent that!" And I would have, too, if it had not been for my sensitive side reminding me just how many people would be induced to vomit at the sight of my hairy cheeks.

I have a picture of that costume at home that I'll scan in soon. Watch this space!