Sarah remembers

My housemate Sarah has seen nearly every performance I’ve ever done! This morning we decided to go through each one and this is how she recounted them. It’s interesting to hear the things that stuck in her brain!

the one where you were a pirate boy

the one with the madonna boobs

the one where you kissed Scott Chester

the Halloween one with crazy arse clowning

the one with your vagina

the one where you were really old

the one where you were a popcorn sellar

the one with your caterpillar

the one with all the dancing

the one with the obstacle course

the one with the white rabbit who you couldn’t see

Shame at the Surgery

I wrote this about a year ago. I don’t think the themes discussed have been outdated in anyway.

Today I went to my local doctor’s surgery with a woman’s problem. I am always fussy about my doctors. I must have a woman doctor because my problems are almost always exclusively women’s problems and despite being quite an unembarrassed kind of a person, I draw the line at telling attractive young male doctors that my vagina is a terrible place.

My nice woman doctor calls me with her sweet honey voice “Katherine..?” She looks nice. I’m sure she’ll be nice and sympathetic and not too patronising but not too cold. Yes she’ll be lovely.

“I’ve got some medical students in with me today, just observing. Hope you don’t mind”.

My heart sinks. “Yeah, that’s fine”.

It’s not just one student. No. It’s two students. Blatantly a similar age to me. One is a rather muscular male medical student. I’m sure it’ll be fine. I’m sure he’s very professional. I’m sure he won’t judge. I’m sure I won’t see him shopping in sainsbury’s later. Or I might . Shit. I might see him in sainsbury’s later. Buying a warburton’s toastie loaf. I might see him in sainsbury’s later and he will think “HA….her vagina is a terrible place”. I can’t take it.

“No…actually…sorry…I….erm….am quite embarrassed.” And the medical students are sent out into the corridor.

Now comes that time, that time about 5 minutes into every NHS health centre experience, where I am asked to wee in a cup. That time when I have to take my cup and my shame all the way down the corridor, through the waiting room of ill sad ashamed people (plus two young attractive medical students) and to the all-too-clearly signposted toilet with the handrail and the red pull string which I am always tempted to pull and when asked loudly through the door by the receptionists “is there a problem in there?!”, shout back “Yes, I’ve been asked to wee in a cup again.”.

They’ve recently changed their policy on wee containing recepticals. This time, instead of a very very small container with a lid, I’ve inexplicably been handed a pint size plastic cup. Like the ones you drink cider out of at festivals, like the ones you stand about with awkwardly at barbecues.

And it’s not the weeing in the cup that embarrasses me. I can wee in a cup anytime. It’s the walking around in a public space holding a cup of my own wee in my hand. My walk of wee-shame back to the consultancy room through the bleak corridors of Mount Pleasant health centre strongly resembles sad evenings wandering aimlessly at grotty teenage parties circa 2001 clutching a plastic cup of cider and feeling sorry for my un-kissed self only this is a special party where the guests only drink their own urine. This is a shit party. A shit party at an NHS health centre.

My Hellish Day

The following passage provides a minute-by-minute, detailed account of a hellish day I experienced recently. Here it is for your enjoyment. I hope you enjoy it. No bankers were harmed.

9.30 wake up at Isley’s house on Finsbury Park Road.

10am leave house.

10.12am stop to purchase bagel loaf from the bagel shop on Seven Sisters.

10.15am narrowly miss bus to Waterloo

10.40am get on bus to Waterloo believing it will take 28 minutes leaving plenty of time before my train at 11.20am.

11am get stuck in traffic in Islington. feel mildly nervous.

11.10am 10 minutes till train departs. perspire.

11.20am miss train whilst sitting on bus. remain calm.

11.21am arrive at Waterloo station.

11.30am Man at ticket desk at Waterloo looks at me, looks at my tickets and says “Oh God, you can’t use these” and charges me £42.90 for another ticket. I don’t have any cash as as cash point ate my card the day before. Can’t use card.

11.40am Wander streets of Lambeth looking for a branch of Natwest.

11.50am Burst into tears on Waterloo bridge and consider jumping. Call boyfriend instead who offers appropriate amount of sympathy.

11.55am Experience mental breakdown in Parliament Square. Ask myself questions such as “Why, oh why is it all so fucking shit?”…etc….

11.58am Consider mugging smug bankers with blunt instrument.

12pm Have overwhelming realization that society is utterly fucked and that my life is controlled by a handful of faceless, greedy corporations who don’t give a shit about me or anyone else. Overwhelmed by the absurdity of it all.

12.05pm Approach policeman in Parliament Square, weeping, and ask directions to the nearest branch of Natwest.

12.10pm Wonder if I should just go the whole hog and make things really difficult for myself and throw my purse under a bus, my phone down the drain and my favourite childhood toy into the Thames. I mean, why not?

12.15pm Find Natwest draw out £50.

12.20pm Stop crying.

12.30pm Purchase bus ticket to Exeter for £30.

12.33pm Eat a Burger King.

An Apology to David Willetts

Dear David,

I just wanted to send you an apology, David. I’d like to apologise for what I’ve done and for all the problems I’ve caused. David, I’m sorry.  I really am.

David, I’m sorry I’m a woman.

I’m sorry I’m not a housewife, David. I’m sorry I’m not domestic, David. I know that’s unbecoming in a woman.

I’m sorry I’ve taken up a university place that otherwise “that could have gone to ambitious working-class men”, David. I’m sorry I have a first class degree. I’m sorry I earn my own living. I’m sorry I pay my taxes. I’m sorry I walk alone in public, David – I know you don’t like me to be unescorted by my dad/brother/husband, David. So I’m sorry about that, David.

I’m sorry a small few of us have been getting in the way in the house of commons and in the boardroom, David. I know you men like to get on with your business. You’ll be happy to hear that it’s a small rebel minority who have been causing you such bother. We’ll just make the tea from now on, David.

I’m sorry I speak my mind, David, I really am. I’m sorry I have an opinion. I’m sorry if that offends you. I’ll be more careful from now on.

 

Katherine M Tranter.

 

Bunny walks the line – episode two (the slackline strikes back)

My friend Phil, 23, of Linz, Austria has kindly agreed to teach how to walk on a slackline. A slack line. Like a tight rope only slacker and wobblier. Last week, I was introduced to the rope. This week I am very excited. It’s a sunny day and I am ready to conquer the rope.

 

I get up on the rope, I fall off. I get up on the rope, I fall off. I do this many times before realizing that I have hit a metaphorical brick wall. I am not progressing from last week’s triumphant accomplishment – 3 steps on the rope. What to do……

I try talking to the rope. Generally, I talk to things. My dog, my laptop, my dinner, etc. So I talk to the rope. I try to charm it. Then I shout at it. I try to persuade it and bring it around to my way of thinking. It’s not bloody working. I have learned an important lesson. Do not personify the rope. Do not attempt an emotional dialogue with the rope. Do not beg the rope. Do not barter with the rope. Because when it comes down to it it’s just a piece of rope and some gravity and it’s not going to let you balance on it just because you speak sweet words to it.  It has no humanity. Lesson learned.

I now venture into the realms of ritual. I try shouting “UP!” like in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone when they’re trying to mount their brooms for the first time. “UP!” “UP!”…It’s sort of working. Shouting “UP!” momentarily distracts me from concentrating too hard on stepping onto the rope. So it’s kind of just happening and I’m not thinking about it. This is good. But I’m still not going anywhere once I’m on the rope. Apart from going banana shaped and falling off in a comedic fashion with lots of silly arm waving.

I’m getting nowhere. Phil says “Try something different”. I go one step further than that. I do something both stupid and different. (get it? one step! see what I did there? I am so clever!)I attempt getting on the rope backwards with the help of a tree. The results weren’t nearly as catastrophic as they might have been. See right.

Having been a bit silly, laughed a bit and taken a break, I get back on the rope. I am much more focussed and find a new sense of balance which takes me about3 feet towards the centre of the rope. Great success!

All photos are by my friend Phil Ehmann. He is an excellent photographer. You could pay him to take photographs for you if you’d like. He’s really rather good. You could visit his blog: http://phij.deviantart.com or follow him on twitter: @phideljo

Bunny walks the line – episode one

My friend Philip Ehmann, 23, of Linz, Austria has kindly agreed to teach me how to walk on a slack line. A slackline is a rope, slacker and bouncier than the famous tight rope often seen in street theatre and circus acts, strung up between two trees at a great height. In the interest of health and safety and not breaking my legs/head/life/dignity, our slackline will be  rigged up just above grass level.

I know what you’re thinking, I know what you’re longing to ask me. ‘Why?’….I know, right? The answer is simple….employability. Now over 10 months into ‘real life’ having graduated last year, I have quickly learned that the more bizarre and rare skills you can put on your CV the more employable you become. So when the call comes for a small blonde clown/actor/musican/slack rope walker who plays concertina/sax/piano/drums/didgeredoo/penny whistle and has extensive experience of dragon riding I’ll be the industry’s first port of call. (I admit – I may have exaggerated somewhat just then).

It’s the first sunday in March, a cold bright Sunday and we meet in Northernhay Gardens where we are unable to find any appropriate trees – not too thick, not too skinny, not too close together, not too far apart, not too mossy, not too sassy and definitely not on a slope. We mosey through Northernhay Gardens and through the castle wall to Rougemont Gardens. Still no tree joy. So we pootle on to Bury Meadows, a flatter alternative with ample tree facilities.

Phil rigs the rope. I observe with from a mid-distance feeling the fear brewing in my stomach. The rope is up and it’s looking at me with it’s wobbly smugness. It is challenging me.

I step with my right foot onto the rope and clutch hold of Phil and tentatively walk along the it. I am three years old again teetering along a stone wall with mum holding my hand. “I’m doing it! This is easy!”, I’m thinking before I remember that the only reason I’m still on the rope is because I’m clutching my dear Austrian friend with all my strength. I am cheating.

“When we learned, we didn’t really do the whole ‘hold me’ thing”, says Phil. I can see why. I’ve got to learn to get up there on my own. Pretending there’s going to be support there is futile because there isn’t. Otherwise it wouldn’t be a very impressive skill…..

“Roll up roll up see the most death defying act in the history of the world ever……BUNNY ON THE HIGH WIRE….one foot from the ground holding her mummy’s hand.”

So Phil steps back and half watches the football whilst I attempt to go it alone. Of course, just getting onto the rope is a challenge and I practise vaulting myself up there pushing with my right foot on the rope and bringing the left to join it. After 30 or so attempts I am able to get up and stay up for about half a second. This seems to be all about focus (and protecting your soft parts when you fall off) The focus brings the balance.  Instantly, a hundred instructions from my performer training days doing martial arts come into my head in the inimicably soothing voice of Professor Philip Zarrilli. “Do or do not do…there is no try”….(Yes, I know Yoda says this in star wars episode four, but Phillip was saying it decades before star wars hit the cinemas)

I stop thinking about what I’m doing and I just do it. It sort of works. By the end of my first lesson I can get on the rope and walk about three steps before falling off again. And it feels great.

 

a human at the checkout

Over 21 years of confusion in small overpriced supermarkets. Pennsylvania road co-op circa 2007.

I’m queueing in Sainsbury’s local. Local, in this context, meaning nowhere near your house, more expensive than any independent food shop and the only place open after 8pm in Exeter. I’m actually quite enjoying the queue; it’s been a long day staring at a computer screen and I’m grateful not to have to type meaningless digits into a smug flashy database that knows it has a higher IQ than I do.   I assume I’m queueing for the self checkout ( as one does!) and on any other day, I’d be right. But no. No, no, no. Today, for the first time. ..there are humans manning the checkouts. ‘NEXT PLEASE’ And suddenly I’m dragged from my peaceful coma queue state by the shocking and unexpected sound of a human voice.

SHIT. I hadn’t prepared for this. I had NOT prepared for this. However, what I was perfectly prepared for was to scan my warburtons toastie loaf myself, place my item oh so very carefully in the bagging area (so as not to upset aforementioned bagging area), scan my nectar card (clubcard…PAH)…I’d even brought my own bag thus winning EXTRA nectar points. I know the system inside out and back to front. I even know how to ‘look up item alphabetically’. And not just potatoes and apples…no…I can even do grapefruits. I could charge myself for a  grapefruit in my sleep. But it doesn’t matter now. My advanced skills on the sainsbury’s local self checkout mean nothing now. NOTHING. Shit, shit, shit. He’s looking at me. This strange imposter. This strange maroon uniformed imposter. How dare he. How dare he disrupt the cold yet gloriously simple relationship between the efficient newfangled money taking machine and me.

Time stands still. I take a tentative step towards the human at the checkout. He says…’Hi’. I say…’Hi’. He scans my warburtons toastie loaf. ‘How kind’, I think to myself. He says..”Do you have a nectar card?”. I ask him to repeat the question. I am unable to recognise the phrase ‘nectar card’ when not announced at me, slightly too loud, by my automated friend the efficient newfangled money taking machine.  In this human’s voice, this familiar, comfortingt phrase is rendered completely alien. Furthermore, he has taken the time to think outside  the box and has cleverly rephrased “Have you swiped your nectar card?” with a somewhat unconventional “Do you have a nectar card?”. He’s trying to trick me, but I outwit him and  hand mine over having taken a moment to faff about with my purse trying to find it. “Do you need a bag?”. “No I’ve got my own thank you”.  I beam at him, wondering if he’s remembered to put extra points on my card for being such a good noodle by bringing my reusable canvas bag.  I take my warburtons toastie loaf, my receipt and my beloved nectar card and I leave the shop with a spring in my step, elated, shocked and invigorated at having encountered a human at the checkout.