Bleux Stockings Vol. 1: Mauree Culberson
We are delighted to reprint Mauree Culberson's piece from our January show.
Binge with a Capital B
I love a good Binge. But shame gets in the way sometimes. Mostly I ignore that dude. I admit I have been late to work because I just couldn't pull myself away from wallowing in the embrace of the sameness. Law and Order has my number and they have it memorized. Expecting the expected and getting it can sometimes be sweeter than honey.
It's that moment. The dark room only lit by the blue glow of the TV. I'm covered in blankets, a Snuggie maybe. I'm wearing pjs or thermals with pit stains, unshowered. I reach into the bag with my greasy fingers for the last pinch of salty oily potato chip crumbs or the end piece in the brownie pan. The temperature is right. A bit chilly so my feet are in socks. The pillows have molded to my body shape. I have plenty more to drink and the next episode is getting good like one of the main characters might bite it this time or they finally kissed. But the bag of chips is empty; the last brownie I ate really was the last brownie.
I guess it's time to edit that piece I've been working on or put some time in on that big project. I’ll try not to look too bummed as I load the dishwasher or take the trash out. But I can’t help it the spell has been broken.
Few Binges are all good or all bad. But I have discovered I can choose my Binges.
I tried years ago to Binge on popular culture. Jokes were going over my head, references to anything recent was like listening to a conversation in a Klingon if you'd never before seen Star Trek. So I tried to consume celebrity data like a supercomputer. Know the ages and birth weight of every kid on The Duggars. What American Idol runners-up did better monetarily than the winners? How sad was each of their back-stories? Whatever happened to Moesha, Mo’Nique, Mo Rocca? How many steps would it take you to connect Macaulay Culkin to Kevin Bacon? What do Judy Garland and Diana Ross have in common other than The Wiz or the Wizard of Oz? How many licks does it take to get to the tootsie roll center of a Tootsie Pop? These facts, dates, and your ability to recall celebrity names by just the outfit they wore at the Golden Globes did not fill that social void.
Binge is not a four-letter verb. The self has many facets. I took a few hours out of my week to reconnect in person or at least via chat with a person whose work I admire. I had lunch with someone who admires my work. Suddenly it became a habit. Habits that end in positive outcomes, I start to crave. Cravings for more of this bountiful interaction lead to groups and groupings. Next I'll find myself at a retreat. A retreat from those who might be disturbed by our collective Binge.
Video games are a Binge I can relish from a voyeuristic perspective but I see the appeal of direct engagement. Escape into an interactive world of imagination and release your tensions and anger in pretend explosions and gunfire. Shiny guns, big guns, old-timey guns, space guns, double-barrel, a gun with heat-seeking rounds. Skinny guns, tall guns, short guns, small guns. They don't call it gun porn for nothing. Morals to the wind yes. But explicit rules that don’t waver like the outside world. Emotional ups and downs but you can win. Hatchet zombies in the face. Be an assassin who plots the last moments of her victims down to the last detail. Obliterate giant space robots or join forces with them. Lay siege to this planet or some other one if that suits you better. Become a mage, an undead warrior who herself is half dead. Hunt vampires monsters terrorists or just regular people. Steal a car and mow down unsuspecting citizens in heels. I can wear all of the clothes or none of the clothes. I can change what I look like with the click of a button.
Of course then, I want to Binge on reality.
I can choose to Binge on the unflinching truth of our historic and present violence. Read not just the sadness, but the hope too. Starving children, war torn land, those groups and individuals unbashfully vying for peace and humanity. We are both different and the same as the mud prints that face our backs and the quicksand that lies ahead. Even with the sun in your eyes you can feel the heat on your neck. Examine the scars and the triumphs of the martyrs who took the licks so that you and I can vote and speak freely. They deserve my study and my contemplation. To know is to love. To love is to cherish. Cherish what they have done and my quick sand becomes just sand. The next time I need to speak out and up and ruffle some feathers as some say, my chin is lifted. My eyes stern and I think I could've been speaking up and out this whole time. Those feathers I ruffled were just chickens anyway.
Now my favorite Binge is on you. That trip you took with the romantic view cuddled in your lover’s arms. I go back to it sometimes. Then I look at my card statement and see I haven’t been out to a new restaurant in like four months. I look at your holiday posts with you and your family with your little one cute as a button bundled up. Then I look at that cactus in the trashcan we let die. That's right, a cactus. Perhaps we should’ve bought a rug instead.
This year I’m going to Binge on me. No going to a place just because everyone else does. Why do I wanna go? No working on projects I don’t have my heart in. What do I love about it? How does it fuel what I want? What can I learn? How can my skills be best applied to this idea so that the outcome is satisfactory to me as well as them? If the outcome isn’t positive in an endeavor—in the showing or in the growth—why bother? I might as well put my pjs back on, grab my Snuggie and make another pan of brownies.
