Living out loud comes naturally to me. Telling the truth is my knee-jerk reaction. I’m open, not secretive. I’ve actually had to learn to temper these instincts in order to be tactful and not hurt people’s feelings. But I still won’t lie outright. So when
When I was 23, I had a boyfriend who was obsessed with Pam Anderson from Baywatch. I can still hear the yearning lustfulness in his voice. “She’s soooo hot,” he’d moan every day. It was the early 90’s, the height of Anderson’s fame and her image
I was dancing on stage at Ten’s World Class Cabaret in New York City the first time a customer said this to me. The stages at Ten’s were small. The club itself was small and intimate, the kind of place where our finance-bro customers felt comfortable approaching
Author’s note: I originally wrote this story in 2023. The encounter with Donald took place during my earliest years working as a dancer, more than twenty years earlier. The descriptions of club cuture and language reflect that period. Recently, I was chatting with a lawyer friend who said, “people
I was partying with an ex-cop and a runaway preacher’s wife at 5am on a random weekday. The preacher’s wife and I met at a Manhattan gentleman’s club where we both worked as dancers. She never wanted to be a preacher’s wife; it was a
It was 1985. I was 15, a sophmore in high school and captain of the junior varsity cheerleading squad. Freshman year had been lonely and awkward. I’d moved from a town where Marlboro Reds and black leather jackets were cool. At my new school, lacrosse and Ralph Lauren were
Every once in a while I’ll see a young woman openly weeping on the streets of New York. She’s always well dressed and on the move, clearly in the midstof her day-to-day routine. Maybe in another city, she’d get to cry in the privacy of
I stepped out of the elevator into the lobby and didn’t notice anything was wrong. Sure, I saw a few heads turn then quickly look away, but I didn’t think much of it. It was early and I was still groggy. In the time between waking up and
Originally published on Medium in February 2024. This essay documents my thinking at the time. I can’t believe anyone denies climate change. I’ve seen the climate change in my own short life. Winter in New York is not what it used to be when I was a kid.
I was talking with a coworker, a fellow stripper (or to be more specific, I was listening to her) when my eyes were opened to something I hadn’t considered before—this girl had organized her life around an advertising image: luxury cars parked in the driveways of big houses.
Working as a dancer in Manhattan’s gentlemen’s clubs, I’ve enjoyed an ideal work/life balance. The first thing I do when I wake up is drink coffee and write in my journal. As a stripper, I’ve had time to think. I, like Jeff Bezos, “like to
The Manhattan gentlemen’s clubs I’ve worked in had a zero tolerance policy on violence. Customers came to us for an upscale experience—violence wasn’t on the menu. Management never even used the word “stripper.” We were referred to as “entertainers.” Fighting with each other was not tolerated.
Motherhood is one of the few things I’ve taken seriously. I’ve always known that if I’m going to bring a baby into this world, I have to be 100% sure I can care for that child properly. As the unplanned child of a teenage mother, I learned
I vividly recall the moment when Bill Clinton “did not have sexual relations” with Monica Lewinsky. It was the late 1990’s. I was an aspiring actress tending bar at a Manhattan gentlemen’s club. My customers were wealthy, mostly married men seeking attention from younger women. Between what I