Running like a Woman with Her Hair on Fire

Politically Correct in America

42 PoLitiCALLy CoRReCt in AmeRiCA I told my first husband I wanted to be kidnapped by terrorists. I would fall in love with one of them, I said, and commit terrible political acts for him like Patty Hearst who really did it all for love which she called “brainwashing.” My husband took it very personal though I didn’t mean it exactly like that. His disappointment was evident. I was insane then, always with my rear end on one side of the crazy line and my feet over on the other. He left me shortly after the terrorist remark, for a woman who had her degree in biology and a bank account of four figures. It was forseeable. My daughter said I handled it well. In March, they turned off my lights for the first time. I borrowed to turn them back on.Then, they turned off my gas and water. I slept with a neighbor for money to turn them back on. Yesterday, the man from the phone company tried to get into my pants. I’ve forgotten his name, but I had the phone turned off because I can’t pay the bill and there was sure as hell no chemistry between the telephone man and me. My daughter says “What’s the difference?” I wish I had my degree in biology 43 and a big bank balance. I wish I knew how to get those things without maybe fucking a banker or a few professors. My paycheck doesn’t cover what two paychecks did and, each time I hear a knock at the door, I know that the terrorists are ready for me. ...