Another Roadside Sideshow Distraction Daydream

 

Rusty Gash was not just her stage name.

Her nickname was Rusty because she was

an inveterate Tomboy. Her name was really

Shirley, and I´m not kidding. Gash came along

after she began her career as an ecdysiast.

She came up with the name, and customers

seemed to remember. She was the original

glam-rock stripper. She could out geek Alice

Cooper, and how she mixed that with

eroticism was downright special. I can´t go into

details until I get the rights to show the video.

 

Shirley had two distinct characters: Rusty the

entertainer and as a waitress at an established

diner. Both were cliches and she enjoyed

playing both roles equally. The people that

knew her didn't really know her. What was

she doing in the basement of her brownstone?

Cooking drugs? Making I.E.Ds? Digging an

underground tunnel system…(those were all

the rage these days in all the urban

no-mans´-lands)

 

The apartment she lived in looked out the

back to a backyard that had four buildings that

cloistered the area. Shirley could look into the

windows of her neighbors´ apartments if their

shades weren't drawn and sometimes, at night,

she turned off the lights in her apartment and

look out at her neighbors to see what they might

be up to. She would do this when she took

breaks from her work in the basement.

 

And how her life ties all together is beyond me.