So I have a copy of "Hip: The History" by John Leland sitting in my pajama lap. I'm only to page twenty nine because I'm cashed (although I just chewed some coffee beans and spat 'em out in the bathroom sink), have smoked several non-additive free cigarettes I got in a trade for buying a beatnik girl lunch in a small town. I'm wearing a tie-dyed shirt a friend got me at the Chicago Peace Fest that has a see-through alien face on it reading "we come in peace." I feel hip daddy-yo. The fun thing about this book is you can go to the index and find hipsters such as Chris Roc and Nathaniel Hawthorne but I don't see me. So what I want to know is why am I not in here? Leland told us not to feel bad if we weren't in the index, but I don't find this fair play on his part. I have my props John. I'm almost middle aged, I have suffered two meltdowns, and am almost on my third (my therapist is making me post this). I have a poetry chapbook my sister published.

I've done the Jack and Neal adventure three times but have never been to Truckee, so maybe that's why I'm not in there. I've partied with clowns in the Grateful Dead parking lot--the bowl had beads man. I've hung with street urchins sharing chewing gum with disorders not recognized by the DSMRIII who study diagrams of pool tables for fun. My running buddies include penniless poet wanna be popstars and bad asses who create glass collages and dream catchers made out of found string. Girls with no tattoos and Reeboks they bought at the local thrift shop. My boyfriend wears Carhartt and drives a Comet. My cellphone is two years old and still doesn't have a plan. John man. Reconsider. I got my props baby. I swear. Put me in the damn index. I'm a contender.