Move over Joan Didion, Birdie's back in town...

 

Don't Shoot! I'm Just the Avon Lady! by Birdie Jaworski

In Birdie Jaworski's fabulous memoir about selling Avon, "Don't Shoot! I'm Just the Avon Lady!" Birdie pens words that fly. She doesn't just talk about selling Avon or the ridiculous situations that happen. She does do all that, but she also does much more.

Her words breathe fire into a journey in which you float high above the universe in a magically altered state where you forget to breathe and you believe that everything is real, when suddenly, the pages end. Then Birdie plops you back into your armchair, computer hutch or coffee shop, where you sit slack jawed and you scratch your head, knowing that you're somehow richer, better and forever altered by the experience.

There is no way to describe how Birdie writes. You just have to feel Birdie's words for yourself. In the excerpts below, you will see what I mean:

Birdie lives in the “golden curve of Southern California that swells with tourists every day of the year, swells with yuppies who point cameras at the seals and snap” in the land of “six thousand chi-chi clothing boutiques and enough New Age churches to save the world if only their attendees tossed enough money the coffers and rattled endless affirmations.’’

She’s searching for a vitamin, not just ANY vitamin, but an appeasement for an extremely demanding customer, and so Birdie goes to all the vitamin stores, and ...

“tumbled down the coast, closer and closer to the land of sunset money, until I landed in La Jolla, in a high-end grocery store by the highway, by the sea. I tried to forget the phone call that rattled my nerves, made me so unstable that I promised a cranky customer I would find her vitamin holy grail.’’

In looking for the ultimate vitamin for an Avon customer, a wonder happens. Wonders always happen in Birdie-land. A customer at the vitamin store notices Birdie’s flawless complexion and wants to know what she uses, because the woman’s friend has a zit, a bad, bad zit. And he’s giving a concert.

And then it happens. Not the zit. Yes, there was a zit, but ...

...“it wasn’t the sheer sexy loveliness of his carefully groomed pompadour - it was The Voice. He whispered “Hey Baby” and ran his hand along the back of the woman so much like a La Jolla munchkin next to him, a drop-dead gorgeous singer-actor, a man whose songs rang out of my van tape player on all those Saturday drives with my Turkish friend, the music we loved so much, music with sparse guitar and lullaby border hymns, music where you sing and think and dream, just wonder.’’

…She gives him the brochure of Avon products and…

“He lifted the brochure, touched it with music-god long fingers, lifted it, opened it in a gesture of kindness’’…and ‘’ that night I met The Voice near midnight dream waters. I didn’t dwell on the tampon, didn’t carry a purse as I hovered in the ether. The Voice stood and began unbuttoning his shirt. As sun hit bare skin, he dove into the water, popped to the surface and treaded water. I didn’t stop to think, left my clothes in a heap and dove in, too. We swam for twenty minutes, maybe half an hour, climbed out and lay on the lava rocks in the sun, let the heat beat down and dry our bodies, dry my mind. I didn’t make the first move. He didn’t either. I think the ancient volcano forced fire around us, drove us into each other. Our fingers met, eyes, then legs, arms, mouths, a tangle of island sweat and fury on the edge of an unrelenting ocean.

...Ring! The phone pulled me back to the black rust of night. I raised my head and opened…’’

The stories are all simply amazing........ They lift you up and drop you in the middle of the desert, as you float on a magic carpet over the atomic detruitus of our lives...as she examines the human condition and the mysteries of ....

You will agree.  Nobody can write like Birdie...

You can't describe her writing.

You just have to breathe it for yourself.

Breathe it here:

Kindle and paper. If you don't have a Kindle, you can get the free Kindle for PC download and Kindle for Mac from Amazon and you can read it on your PC.  (Change the background from white to sepia or black; adjust the font size and the number of words per line; have the chapters/stories linked on the left tab; bookmark, add notes, check definitions...more...)

 

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