Lady Jonathan Tells All, #16
“I wish to take off some asshole masks, if I can”
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dear lady j,
I have given up transitioning from a waxed faced lezbro to a 6’4″ buxom babooshka dyke for my stay out West. The “asshole mask” of an attempt at an, albeit “scraggly,” beard is working — I get more looks but can relax and remain my “Morrissey self.” It is a relief in the world of being single, I am dating more and feeling more hope about some day meeting someone I can really be compatible with.
The thing is, Lady J, I resent the beard. I am not cutting off “the asshole mask” — it has become a practical necessity in dating out West. It makes my face less round and friendly looking, and helps me hide my gender construct rejecting self. But all the while, it remains a bitter reminder of the way in which the appropriation of battitude is presently very hip among people I would have music, art, and political inclinations in common with in this region of the country — ironically, a country that these folk, by and large, oppose the policies of, that in fact exercises a true battitude of empire, economic slavery and species extinction.
Nevertheless, I am more hopeful I will be able to date here more with my “asshole mask” — so it is growing on me as we speak. While it may be easy to complain that people are more attracted to assholes, I believe this is a misanthropic statement, and if I were to make it, highly hypocritical. I shared my life with an asshole, we were together for nearly a decade, and as I still struggle with singleness after I was betrayed by numerous secret affairs with our bearded, burly neighbors leaving my waxed face ignorantly lost in a seductive concoction of broken dreams and snores. Yet despite our sudden and painful split I still find myself drawn to complete assholes. I am pulled to them with intense gravity and magnetism, blinding forces, tractor beam forces, until weeks or months later when I snap out of it and realize I did it again and dated an asshole. So I am asking you Lady J, how do all of us assholes, genuine and in “masks of the asshole,” hold out long enough to find each other?
I am looking for another in an “asshole mask,” and I long for the day we can reveal ourselves to each other and take off our butt faces! I also want all the true assholes to find each other, in an assholeary! They can frolic, condescend, betray, get hopelessly lost in themselves and always be perfect and leave the rest of us alone! I know I am not asking for too much — but it takes time!
Presently there is still an asshole in my life. The other day we were shopping for new beds and the asshole expounded on details from dates the week before while telling me which mattresses offered the most support. We broke things off years ago and I think there is no hope at removing this ex’s “asshole mask.” It is a kind that is knitted in star shaped patterns to your facial bone structure with yarn made out of repurposed multicolored plastic grocery bags. But sometimes, sometimes I get lonely and bored and find it difficult to socially coordinate with people of common interests in the sprawling West, and OkCupid makes me want to be a cutter: “I am not going out like that,” I tell myself. Maybe I am still lying to myself that this asshole in fact has a mask, one that I could subtlely take off, while I provide emotional support with the loneliness of doing errands, the loneliest things in the world I think.
I also want to say, I realize my issue with assholes may offend them, I can think they are narcissists (a name that especially offends narcissists, which I do not wish to do, and have been exchanging for the phrase ‘highly self focused, hyposocial individuals, with a fervent need for emotional distance and irreproachability”) but lately I just want to be free from them in my thoughts and daily experience as much as possible. And herein lies the crux! I am living in “the heart of the asshole of the Rocky Mountains” (the Coeur de l’âne as I like to misspell it poetically), and I do not wish to close my doors to my fellows in “asshole masks” on the street, arm myself, or recede into some heart of my own darkness – I know some of these bearish, rich WASPY 1%er-seeming assholes here are just in bearish furry waterbag costumes like me! Hating them also makes me hate myself. I wish to walk in love through valley of wedge politics and economics and zip codes that simultaneously divide and edify this country’s classes and groups, often sadly defining them! I wish to take off some asshole masks, if I can, before I grow elderly and decrepit (many perhaps!) all the while, disguised as the asshole called “man” I walk amid all these constructs flirting at masks or just assholes and asking you for advice in having more patience, strategy, courage, and steadier aim with a new found, furry faced cupidity. Living in the heart of the asshole can be blinding with sadness; treating poison with poison offers a furry hope! I wish to gather more knowledge from the animal kingdom as I face myself and these cyborg drone times that seem to make saying hello to a face, and not the asshole of global capital’s sweatshop touch screen cross hairs, more and more rare.
walk in love,
breaking into or out of the heart of asshole
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Dear Heart of the Asshole,
I’ll start by saying that the asshole sanctuary you mentioned, the place where assholes can find each other and leave all the non-assholes alone, is called the United States of America. Man, what a bunch of assholes we are.
I’m not saying there aren’t assholes all over the world because assholes dot the planet in multitudes. In fact, Lady Jonathan has encountered assholes all over the globe in many different brands. The French Asshole for example is different than the British Asshole and even different from the French Moroccan Asshole. I know nothing about Bolivian Assholes, and perhaps too much about Chilean Assholes.
It is important to become clear about the size and shape of the assholes around us.
I urge readers to print this list off and use it as a checklist for potential mates. You too, Heart. Scoring even one point on this list is cause for warning. However, each person should identify which asshole characteristics they are willing to deal with, in case they meet someone who has mostly redeeming qualities and a yacht.
Being mean is really the most problematic asshole trait. A nice person will be nice to you, and in the end, allow you to walk away with dignity.
Before going any further into the plight of the heart of the asshole, I’d like to know why a beard symbolizes battitude to you. If you look good in a beard, there really isn’t much more to it. It’s not like you needed a swastika tattoo on your neck to start attracting women. Beards also symbolize someone who is stylish, on the pulse of society, a hater of politics, a lover of organic foods and someone who is manly. I know the man-waif look has made it hard for real men to go shopping, but I am here to tell you some women are still attracted to masculine qualities. I have a friend who goes gaga for chest hair, and another who swoons at a large Adam’s Apple. So you may be projecting all of the above attractive qualities to women. People do things and wear things to attract people so they can mate. Your beard is no different than the perfect pair of worn leather boots. It’s not an asshole mask.
Others are indeed wearing asshole masks, but I’d argue that most of them are just actual assholes.
In this case, my sincere advice to you is to feel, rather than analyze. Stop looking and start feeling. Tap into your senses. Develop them. Hold someone’s hand and see how your stomach feels while doing so. Put their vibe in the petri dish of your intuition.
You ask how to hold out long enough to meet a non-asshole. That’s super easy. Hold out because a) it’s super fun to be single and b) being single is way better than dating an asshole. Assholes slowly pick away at your bones until you’re a cripple. Then, they leave you crippled—totally disabled when it comes to new relationships.
I’m afraid that may be happening to you. You may still be regenerating your bones and soul from the ten years that an asshole was whittling them away. For all we know, your spine could still resemble the flute your ex whittled so you could sing her praises.
Your obsession with knowing if someone is an asshole or not is due to fear. You don’t trust that you can identify a non-asshole. And you still believe an asshole is whom you will end up with.
I demand that you not get into a committed relationship until your casts come off. You wouldn’t do yoga in a body cast would you? It’s not even possible. Your disability will heal as long as you don’t perpetuate it. So steer clear of the possibility that you might. Until then, take vacations into other people’s lives. Check them out. Keep The Pink Starfish Guide to Human Asshole Characteristics (pictured above) in mind. If they score even moderate on the asshole scale, you are not allowed to even run errands with them, for fear that you get attached.
Protect yourself until you are no longer disabled; no one else can.
That’s my human advice. Let’s see what the animals have to say.
What’s that buzzing sound I hear? I’ve drawn Hummingbird!
Hummingbird is associated with the Ghost Shirt religion, which taught that a certain dance done properly would bring about the return of the animals, and that the white people (assholes) would disappear; the Indian race (not assholes) would be restored and a regenerated Earth would come into being where the pristine conditions of life would prevail. It’s clear that this religion is coursing through you at the moment. Let me turn up the volume.
The Mayans taught that Hummingbird is connected to the Fifth World. You may already know this, but we are currently in the Fourth World, moving into the Fifth World of peace, healing, and transformation. I sense your need for movement in this direction.
Hummingbirds are agile; they can fly in any direction. However, Hummingbird can also hover in one spot and appear to be motionless. What’s your current MO, Heart of the Assholes?
Hummingbird feathers are magic and have been used for millennium to make love charms. This bird conjures love as no other medicine does. (Your beard is made of hummingbird feathers.)
Hummingbird detests ugliness or harshness (assholes), and quickly flies away from discord (assholes) or disharmony (assholes).
Fly, Heart! Fly!
Do you feel drawn to an art museum or a concert? It may be that tiny bird leading you there. Hummingbird energetically circles the highest aesthetics with a blurry buzz.
However, aside from sucking-off pistols, there is something important to consider here.
I drew your hummingbird card upside down, which offers an additional twist in meaning. It means Hummingbird speaks to you of matters of the heart. When a contrary Hummingbird is drawn, it may presage sorrow. It may indicate one is wearing itty-bitty blinders and is unable to see the primordial beauty swirling around us.
It’s possible that Hummingbird is singing a forlorn song. Turn down Beyoncé and listen. Can you hear it? If so, take time to journey into your personal pain and remember:
Your sorrow is your joy in another reflection.
My hex on you is that you are going to find someone indefinably kind, and in the meantime, you’re going to still be having the time of your [love] life. At some point, Assholes just get too ugly to keep looking at.
Tiny Hummingbird Hugs,
Lady Jonathan
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