Eurydice Rising

Z: When were you consequential?  

Y: In my twenties. 

Z: (Nodding her head ‘no’ and smirking) Really? 

Y: YES! 

Z: No! You were not! You were trying to be something and terrified you’d never get there. And that made you feel panicked and anxious and like a failure all the fucking time.  

Y: Speak for yourself. I was fabulous!

X: We were all fabulous but if we stumbled or faltered anywhere, we were done for. …so at what point did we make it? Because now it feels like that ‘it’ is in the rear-view mirror and I don’t remember getting there so how have we passed it?  

Z: It’s here. This is IT. Don’t you see? You’re so afraid that no one is watching or that you’re irrelevant that you haven’t copped on. No One Is Watching. You can do and say and fuck whoever you want, however you want, whenever you want. No One Cares!! The cosmic joke on everyone is no one ever did. Are you worried that you’re going to be cyber bullied for wearing the wrong clothes? Or saying the wrong thing? Or fucking the wrong guy? NO!! Are you worried about being slut shamed?  

Y: I don't think I'd mind a bit of slut shaming.

Z & X look aghast 
 
Y: Oh don't get me wrong. I hate that men do it, but I look damn good naked!! I wish everyone could see what I look like in my knickers…or even out of them. Fuck, I watch everything I eat – for what??!! No. One. Is. Looking. At least if my pictures were smeared all over porn sites someone would be looking!  

X: So do it yourself. Why does slut shaming have to come into it?  

Y: I can’t slut shame myself. That would be shameless self-promotion… and I need my shame! I’m catholic for fucks sake. There’s no pleasure in anything without shame. It’s the saffron of a pleasurable Catholic existence. You want just enough to bring out the flavour in everything but not too much or it ruins the whole thing.  

X: You should put that on a t-shirt. 

Y: I’ve tried. It doesn’t fit.  

Z: Give me your pics. I’ll shame you with them. 

Y & X look aghast.

Z: I have plenty of online male personas. I’ll slut shame you whenever you’d like. My point is…no one can hold what we do over our heads anymore so we can do whatever the fuck we like. And we are! Look at us. We’re doing exactly what we want. Exactly how we want. Don’t create drama where there is none.  

X: Maybe Y is right. Maybe we need a bit of saffron to feel relevant. You know on one of the websites I’m on there’s a woman who has fucked 100 men in the past 100 days.  

Y: No way. I don’t believe it. 

Z: Did she announce this to everyone on the site? 

X: No. It was a systemwide status update. Every guy she fucked left a notification on her page and when she got to 100, the system sent out an update about her.  

Y: Did she know the system would do that? 

X: I have no idea. The thing is …I don’t know if I’m truly impressed or a bit horrified. I honestly can’t figure out how I feel about it. 

Y: I’m horrified. 

Z: I’m impressed. 

X: Well fuck you both. That doesn’t help me in the least.  

Z: Why are you horrified? 

Y: Why are you impressed? You’re the one who’s married and monogamous.  

Z: But if I weren’t, I’d fuck 100 men in 100 days – no, I’d fuck 200 men in 100 days. I’d keep condom companies in business.  

X: Hubris!  

Y: I was going to say wishful fucking thinking. 

X: Why would you want to put up with 200 of them. Yeesh. I’d get 195 dildos and have 5 guys in 200 days. 

Z: By that logic you’d fuck 5 guys once each in 2.5 days and play with toys for 97.5 days.  

X: ….don’t do math on me. You know what I mean. 

Z: Yes. But that’s not what you said. 

X: But you know what I mean.  

Z: Of course. I’m just poking the bear.  

Y: THIS!!  This is it. This is The Problem with men! Men don’t know what we mean. They only listen to what we say. My god I think we just cracked the gender nut.  

X: Calm down. You haven’t discovered life on Mars.  

Y: Oh but I HAVE!!  Don’t you see??!! I could write a help self-book and make millions. 

Z: She means self-help book. 

X: So you don’t want to save the world, you just want to make money trying?  

Y: Ah the world can fuck itself. The money will save me.  

Z: Spoken like a truly woke gen Xer.  

Y: I’m a few years younger than you. I’m gen Y.  

X: You mean you identify as a Millennial? 

Y: Ew. No. Gen Y. 

Z: They’re one and the same.  

Y – Noooo. Gen Y comes after Gen X sometime around the 80’s. Millennials were born at the millennia…which is why they are called Millennials. 

X: (handing over her smart phone) Gen Y are Millennials, darlin. Gen Z starts with births in the late 90’s… and according to this, no one knows where it ends.  

Z: I'm Z. You're Y. She's X. Can we please get back to the fucking. I’m a married woman after all. I can talk about generations with my husband.  

X: You don’t talk about fucking with your husband? 

Z: Not about how I would fuck 200 men. No.  

X: Why not? 

Z: You know sometimes you’re not as cute as you think you are.  

X: Is something going on?  

Z: No. But there are boundaries, X. I love that you don’t have them. Everything with you is porous. And I know where that comes from, but other people have boundaries. You do know that? And sometimes pushing buttons just because they’re there is purely destructive.  

Y: In other words, your nihilism is showing.  

X: Boundary noted. It’s okay to smack me on the nose with the paper and tell me to sit. I’m a good puppy. I’ll learn. But I’m not a nihilist. I do believe the world has meaning or that we make meaning out of it. Sometimes.  

Y: You believe it sometimes or it has meaning sometimes?  

X: Yes.