So what are you...

"So what are you going to do ?"
"Mom..."
"What ? You can't talk about things, with your own mother ?"
"I can talk about things. It's just..."
"What ?"
"You say such strange things. Nobody says things like you do."
"Do they cook like I do ?"
"No, I know... it's just... I'm afraid if I agree with you, I won't agree with anyone else ever again."
"It's fashion, baby. When you were seven years old, all your friends, well, you know, the other girls in school decided on this one doll, everyone had to have the one doll. A stupid, obnoxious thing, you pulled the ring and..."
"Sister Belle! The talking doll!"
"Holy god, you remember that atrocity ? With the cloth legs and that ugly face..."
"Oh yeah."
"Wasn't there also a boy one ?"
"Matty I think, or something. That was never popular."
"The boys didn't want it any, huh."
"Nuh-uh."
"Are you still friends with any of those girls ?"
"What, from primary school ? Not really... I mean, we maybe run into each other sometime at the movies or something..."
"And yet, strangely... you did get the doll."
"Uh..."
"I got you that stupid doll, bitch. You remember that ?"
"Yes Mom, I remember. Thank you."
"Nevermind. Mrs. Thompson never got Delia one. Not for lack of trying, mind you. They were out of stock everywhere. She spent hours going from shop to shop, for weeks, the poor woman. She mapped the town out, she'd plan out her route so she'd stop various places on the commute home leaving her enough time to cook and everything. She must've tried fifty, sixty shops that poor woman. Never got one."
"Delia was so sad... She couldn't even play with us anymore."
"For how long ?"
"I dunno... must've been at least a month, I think."
"And yet, you still talk to Delia."
"What do you mean, she's my best friend!"
"Too bad she didn't have the doll."
"Mom... that was just a doll. This is the rest of my life. Everything."
"I remember talking to Aisha back then. She was getting pretty depressed over the stupid thing. I told her it's an eyesore and that I for one would much rather not have it about the livingroom, actual people sitting on the damned thing accidentally because you keep leaving it out and about. I told her it's just some stupid shit you little snots came up with, nobody cares and nobody should care."
"What did Mrs Thompson say ?"
"She said 'I know, honey... now explain this to a seven year old girl. She thinks it's the rest of her life.'"
"This seems so wrong..."
"Of course it does, baby. If it didn't feel so wrong there'd be no stupid people in the world."
"I just want to go to college, get a career... I want to live out my own life!"
"That's so fucking stupid..."
"Living out my life is stupid ?"
"There is no such thing, dummy. 'Your life', what is that ? Do you have underwear on ?"
"Yes mom, I have underwear on."
"For shame. At your age I never wore them."
"Mom!"
"The panties you're wearing, those are 'your panties'. That's a thing. 'Your sex life', that's not a thing. It could be a thing, but it isn't, even though it's described by the same grammatical structure. Your wall is a thing, your sunshine that wall keeps out isn't a thing. Your limitations are a thing, your life isn't a thing. That's how it goes."
"So you don't want me to go to college, because college is like underwear."
"Later, silly. I've got panties on now! We've got that in common, you know, you and me ? We both have panties on. You still live in the little town where you were born, I was born half around the world from here, you've known no man, I've known enough to pick amongst, you're going to get yourself a career, maybe, I'm going to get myself a career, maybe, your life, my life, congratulations, you're living out just like an old woman."
"You're not an old woman."
"Right, right. I also don't get all that horny anymore. How about you ?"
"Oh god!"
"So do something about it."
"What can I do ?"
"Oh I dunno, go sit on a buzzer, like all the other idiots."
"What do you mean 'I've known no man' anyway ? I'm not a virgin, you know."
"Yeah, and how old was he ?"
"Nineteen..."
"I dunno honey, where I come from they call nineteen year olds boys."
"I was sixteen!"
"So ?"
"What do you want me to do, send Delia to fix me a sandwich when we're hanging out, take off my panties, run over to Mr. Thompson, bend over and tell him I have an itch ? See maybe he can scratch it a little ?"
"Yes."
"Mom!... Poor Delia."
"So pick a different one."
"Who ?"
"How the hell should I know ? It's your life, remember. Pick one. Besides, picking's half the fun."
"But I don't want to marry some old dude. What the hell sense does that make ?"
"Why would you marry him ?"
"So what, just whore myself out ?"
"Yes. Let them use you."
"Why ?"
"It's the only way to learn about the world, as a woman. While men use us, we catch our shape, 'your life' becomes a thing from all the hammering you get."
"That's... I don't know if that's beautiful or insane."
"There's this joke, you know, 'in every slab of marble lies a masterpice, all it takes is the chisel work, to get it out.' That's what you are, baby, a seventeen year old girl, a slab of marble. Don't fucking die the same girl, it'd just be too sad. Get the woman hammered out of your baby fat and socially acceptable knickers."
"I'm not fat!"
"You're not a woman, either.
"Do you think I'm fat ?"
"I think you're stupid, letting a bunch of retarded girls run your life for you. Oh no, we all agreed getting the College Doll will fix all our problems, we can finally talk about something else besides the important things, safe and secure in baby Jesus' arms."
"It's fucking scary, Mom. Do you understand that ? It's... it's just..."
"So it's scary. If it weren't scary it'd be boring. What do you wanna be, stabbed or broiled ?"
"Do you not want me to go to college ?"
"Honey, I couldn't give less of a shit. Go, don't go, it doesn't matter."
"How can you say that ?!"
"It fucking doesn't. When I was your age, or maybe even younger, it still mattered, and all the women were up in arms to 'get equal chances to higher education for women'. They did, and guess what ? As they did it stopped mattering. You recall that Mr. McDonalds guy ?"
"The dude that ate nothing but McDonalds ?"
"Yes, him. He got pretty big, huh ?"
"O yeah, a few years ago, all over social media and everything."
"Recently I saw this dumb cunt, trying to chisel some of that for herself. She was going to 'eat only at Starbucks'."
"Why ?"
"'For women', because 'where is the female perspective' or something like that."
"Hahaha"
"Do you think it'll be just as big ?"
"No way."
"Bigger ?"
"No, it's just some attention whore trying to piggyback on some dude's idea. It will go... nowhere. It wasn't even that good of an idea to begin with, he mostly got lucky. "
"But she's doing it for women. That's the important part. The dude didn't do it 'as a man', like the pompous idiots always say. He didn't do it 'for men'. He just fucking went and did it. That's how men do things, and yes, if you ever hear about them again it was mostly because they got lucky, and yes, most don't get even remotely close to lucky ever..."
"You mean, they were fighting for the wrong thing."
"Do you remember what an indirection layer is ?"
"Yes. When you replace a direct function from one domain to another domain with a composition of functions, from the same one domain to the same other domain you're creating indirection layers. If any of the intermediate domains are narrower than the another domain your indirection layers are reductive ; if any of the intermediate functions are not injective then your indirection layers are confounding, they make different things appear the same ; if any of the intermediate functions are not surjective then your indirection layers are lossy, they leave some of the outcomes possible in name only, but unconnected to any causes."
"I love you, baby!"
"You beat me."
"For indirection layers ?! I don't recall that ?!"
"No. For injective."
"Oh."
"Remember ? You got the belt, and I had to..."
"I remember."
"It hurt so bad... I thought you didn't love me anymore. I thought you hated me, I thought you hated me and I should run away."
"I'm sorry, baby."
"Nevermind. I'm glad you did it, I'd much rather know things."
"Yeah..."
"I wish you still did it."
"I can't do it anymore, baby. You're all grown up now."
"I wish Ralph did it, I wish he beat me first and then fucked me."
"Did you ever tell him ?"
"No."
"You want him to figure it out on his own, huh ?"
"Yeah... It's just..."
"It's not the same if you tell him to, is it."
"Not at all. It's not even close."
"That's why I can't beat you anymore either, see. You have to know things, they have to be important things and you have to know them well. To beat someone, I mean. A little girl, like you were, she's got shit for brains, anyone can know important things well enough it's worth beating her for it. Even her mother. But eventually these run out ; and boys don't dare beat you because they have nothing important to say to you. See ?"
"I see. So college's just an indirection layer, the waste of time is not whether you do it or not do it, but obsessing over doing it, and I should find myself men who know things well enough to beat me for it."
"Yes."
"Do you have any idea how insane this sounds ?"
"Sure."
"What if instead of Mr. Thompson I just pick one of the teachers, wear a short skirt commando, show him everything ?"
"College professors are losers in my experience, not worth anyone's time, but... you gotta start somewhere."
"How about I go to Javits Center next they do an amateur night, bare it all and see what happens ?"
"What's that ?"
"Javits Center ? It's the strip club in Manhattan. You know, just by Wall Street. Expensive, too."
"You've been doing research ?"
"Yes Mom, I've been doing research."
"Good for you."
"So you'll drive me there."
"Sure baby, I'll drive you."
"And I have to go naked on stage. Like, take my cheerleader outfit, strip everything off."
"Sounds like a plan."
"I'll do it if you do it."
"What ?"
"You heard me, you go naked on the stage too!"
"But baby... they won't let me get up there."
"That's convenient for you then, isn't it."
"Yes, it is. That's what you get for doing things in their time -- that your life's convenient for you then."
"Fucking bullshit."
"Grin and bear it."
"What if one of the dudes wants to buy this little cow ? He's all like 'oh yeah, that's some nice beef, how much to the pound'."
"You sell it. Ideally not by the pound, though."
"What if he wants anal ?"
"You've never done it there, have you ?"
"Nope."
"You have to let the man hurt you, baby. It has to hurt really, really bad, inside. Otherwise it's no good."
"I'm afraid."
"That's ok. Don't fight it. The fear I mean, don't fight it, for as long as you're afraid you just haven't found your owner yet."
"How do you know when you found him ?"
"When you find him, you're afraid not to."
"Seems a pretty hard call to make, in between two lapdances."
"So don't go on that stage then, if you don't want to. You don't have to, either. The whole world's a stage."