Tina TV: Sexy Chocolate Siren

Growing up in clubland as a hairstylist I had at times gone around with some questionable characters, as you might imagine. There was one in particular that I got along with famously and for years we almost never parted company. Nearly every night of the week we'd be seen at whatever club was popular on that night. The friend that I am talking about was and most likely still is a transvestite and for the sake of concealing her identity I shall call her Pastry.

I met Pastry at a salon that I worked at in the early 1990's. She wasn't my client, but the client of a stylist that worked right next to me. I was very close with this other stylist and it was often that both we and our clients would speak to one another throughout the service. I became familiar with all of my coworkers clients.

Most times Pastry would appear for her appointments looking very androgynous. Sometimes it amused her to be out during the day wearing gangster drag. Pastry was black and made a very intimidating thug when she wanted to. Being intimidating helps when you're confronted by a group of angry and frustrated heterosexual college boys on the street after the clubs let out. Pastry could display an ugly temper when provoked and was agile in heels even at the end of the night, but that's another story for another time.

The salon that I worked for had a large inventory of wigs and hairpieces. We used the hair for photo shoots and platform work and when they were not in use we kept them in a closet that I had the responsibility of maintaining. You can see why Pastry was eager to be my friend. Every night of the week I'd put together some absurd hairstyle for her to wear out to the club. I remember causing such a commotion when we appeared on the scene, Pastry often having to duck as to avoid catching her hair on something because I had piled it up so high. I had added different colors and textures and often accessories like fabric and feathers to go with what she was wearing.

Pastry worked for a local designer that imagined he was Andy Warhol. The workshop was full of club children and wannabees. It was a fun place to hang out when I wasn't working, but it didn't seem like anybody there made any money at all. I think everybody might have been being paid in clothes until the gig ran out and that designer closed up shop. I had always wondered how Pastry made any money and this is where the title of this entry comes into play.

Pastry, I had later found out, was also an escort, spending a good deal of her day turning tricks at her apartment. She played all sorts of characters. I don't know why it had not occurred to me that this is most likely how she made a living. In retrospect it all seems so obvious, but I guess that's part of being in your early twenties. You haven't had enough experience to identify these sorts of things. One day while we were hanging out she was trying to compose a new ad for the Boston Phoenix. At the time I wasn't at all into writing but I told her that I'd be happy to help. Who am I to judge? I'm a hairstylist. I worked with countless drug addicts and I got along with them. Why shouldn't a prostitute make a very nice friend? (My mother would beg to differ, but I am not telling you that story today.) I took a pen and paper (this was before laptops) and I wrote on the paper Tina TV, laughing to myself because if you had ever read the classifieds back then you'd often read about some guy looking for a TV. I had always thought that it was a decently simple thing to find. They were always available in any department store. My guess was that this guy just wanted a bargain. Maybe a used TV. What I didn't know then was that TV was also an abreviation for transvestite. Since you had to pay for every letter you used to compose your ad, it made sense to abreviate. Anyway, Tina TV. I thought that it sounded so commercial. Like an advertisement for a doll that wet her pants when fed water from a bottle. Small children would point at the television while hollering "I want a Tina TV" over their shoulders at their parents. I went on, "Sexy, Chocolate, Siren". I thought that it illustrated exactly what Pastry was trying to say. Short and sweet, with only a few letters to pay for. She loved it and I had never written anything that anybody had paid any attention to in my life. I was so inspired that I wrote her ads for weeks. "Amber Rose: Delicious Dominatrix Demon". "Frivolous Fawn: Flirtatious Fete". I think she'd never been more popular. Seriously. But, like anything the novelty wears away and as time passes people change. I became less of a club kid and I began to see less and less of Pastry and today I couldn't tell you where she is. I do know however that if you look inside of one of my old journals that I used to paste pictures into and write down anything that made me laugh that I wanted to remember, you'll find that first ad there that I cut from the Phoenix when it came out.

While in the shower today I was thinking about how much I enjoy writing. I didn't always like it at all. In school I had always made a poor student so it seems so strange to me that writing has become one of my favorite pastimes. And, I sincerely think it all started with Tina TV.