The Cut Lip

7/9/08

10:42 a.m.

Following eighteen months of post-collegiate cogitation on the career front, I have at last arrived in Chicago to take the plunge into the comedy racket. The Second City headquarters is a mere one-mile stroll from my cousin’s condo. I’m going to hoof it there shortly to enroll in a comedy writing class. I want to look spiffy and make a fine first impression on everyone from the secretaries to Bill Murray (whom I suspect roams the halls repeating the phrase “Gunga-gulunga”), so I’d better scrub off the old stink waves in the shower. And, what the hell, even though I just shaved yesterday and have never made it a daily practice, I’ll take the Mach 3 to my face and shear every trace of stubble to show those clowns how serious I am about silliness.

11:04 a.m.

Slight delay in the plan. I cut myself shaving, just above the right corner of my mouth. A moistened wad of toilet paper is now being applied to the cut. While I wait for the bleeding to stop, I’m going to hone my impression of Rick Moranis from “Ghostbusters.” “ARE YOU THE GATEKEEPER? ” Heh,heh. Can’t wait until the secretary gets a load of that bit.

11:24 a.m.

Yikes. I must have scraped the razor over a thinly lathered gusher spot on my upper lip. Eight squares of toilet paper and the gash is still seeping blood. Unbelievable. Maybe I’ll have better luck using Kleenex since it’s more absorbent than toilet paper. Snot is more liquid-based than feces, after all, and blood is closer to snot in its consistency. Plus, the fabric is smoother, so I’ll run less of a risk of grating the gash and reopening the wound. Kleenex should do the trick, and then I’m off to the Second City.

11:51 a.m.


Sweet Jesus, I have the upper lip of a flounder. How much blood can possibly seep through a gash the size of a cookie crumb? EIGHT squares of toilet paper, SIX Kleenexes, all blotted red. The garbage can is starting to resemble a medical waste receptacle in an operating room. This is my comeuppance for making an effort to look presentable. That’s one of the reasons artistic careers are so appealing: Nobody expects a haggard malcontent to shave everyday.

12:12 p.m.

It’s official: My upper lip is menstruating. I’m never shaving again; it’s too masochistic. Electric shavers always leave behind tiny sprouts of facial hair and traditional razors massacre flesh; there is no happy medium.

Why does society link credibility with one’s insistence on risking bodily harm to remove the hair that grows naturally and without relent? I know why, and I could write the answer with the blood gushing from my upper lip like a sadist’s inkwell: BECAUSE SOCIETY IS A LOAD OF ARTIFICIAL CRAP! Cavemen had it so easy.

What am I going to do? Apply a Band-Aid to my upper lip, stroll down to the Second City, and explain myself when the secretary or Bill Murray gawk at the beige strip beneath my nose? “We don’t allow shaving amateurs in this outfit,” they’re bound to say. Those judgmental jerks.

12:32 p.m.

Three bloody washcloths later, I have no choice but to put on a Band-Aid and bare the embarrassment of a gruesome first impression. If asked about the Band-Aid, which will almost certainly happen, I will contrive a sob story about having a seizure while in the act of shaving. What sort of a monster has the heart to scoff at an injury induced by a seizure? Not even the monsters at the Second City, I should hope. Then all I have to do to maintain the ruse is fake a seizure while enrolling in the class. And a few more phony seizures in the classroom wouldn’t hurt, either…unless of course I bashed my head on the corner of a table as I fell down. This damned shaving wound has cut open a Pandora’s Box of nasty consequences I must cope with.

Phew! I’m getting a bit light-headed. No matter. I’m going to walk down to the Second City and with my final step, insert my foot in the door!

2:19 p.m.

The bad news is that I fled back here without registering for the comedy writing class, still bleeding. The good news is that I stopped weeping a few minutes ago. As I was hurried toward Wells St., turning the blemished side of my face away from passersby whenever possible, I got within two blocks of my destination before being heckled by a street tough in baggy pants. He pointed at me and sneered, “Yo, white boy must be hidin’ the Herp!” Blast! It never occurred to me that the oozing scab caused by a shaving mishap could be mistaken for Herpes. Having a venereal disease is even less appealing than being a novice with the razor-blade. Street toughs assume the most obscene possibility; that’s why any woman in skimpy cutoffs doing the ass volcano in a rap video is deemed a “Ho.”

Well, the encounter jarred my nerves. I tore off the useless Band-Aid as I pivoted toward home, back to seclusion. As a newcomer to this immense city, I took a few wrong turns at full-speed and worked up quite a sweat. The salt that dripped into my wound almost stung as much as five more people speculating that I have Herpes. Eventually I retraced the trail of blood that speckled every third or fourth square of sidewalk and navigated my way back into the neighborhood.

This cut upper lip fiasco has gone on for too long. I’ve no choice but to dial 9-1-1.

2:45 p.m.

It seems my registration with the Second City will have to be postponed. The operator spoke tartly, but I gather that the flesh above my lip has become infected with bacteria. She diagnosed my condition with one word, “Puss-y,” which of course means filled with pus.

Illinois borders my home state of Wisconsin, but nevertheless, it’s going to take some time getting used to the local accent. For a second I thought she said something insulting.