I am quite neurotic about going to the movies. Because in New York City, theaters, especially on weekends, tend to fill up and sell out quickly, I make it a point to show up about an hour early. I feel panicked when there are lines, and I really like to be the first one in the theater to pick the perfect seat. I am really OCD and sitting in the "wrong" seat that just feels off, it can ruin a movie for me.

I rarely go to movies at night, especially on weekends. I tend to go to the first morning show to avoid crowds and find it way easier to go alone than to have to coordinate meeting with others. Movie-going is a process to me and others don't find it so. They find it annoying to have to show up early and prefer to just slink in a few minutes before the show with a devil-may-care-attitude. Me? I'm uptight and can't take that attitude about anything.

However, last night it was cold and snowy. I was getting cabin fever and a friend mentioned he'd drive into the City from Queens if I wanted to see a movie. I had been wanting to see Mickey Rourke's big comeback, so we made plans to see The Wrestler.

He complied and showed up an hour early. We found parking right outside the theater and he suggested going to sit in Starbucks and having a tea for a while.

"Good God, man, are you nuts?" I shouted, explaining that with only 40 minutes to go now there could already be a line.

I asked the ticket seller if many tickets had been sold and she said yes, it was almost sold out. I gave my companion an I-told-you-so-look and hightailed it down there. The line had not begun to form yet, but I stationed myself at the front and was victorious in getting in first and getting the exact right seat.

The movie is about Randy the Ram, an aging New Jersey wrestler. His glory days are fading fast and he is faced with his decline. The movie goes from sad to sadder. Not the movie for someone like me--prone to depression--in the middle of an icy and grey winter.

About 45 minutes into the movie a bearded guy in the very first row corner (loser got there last) stood up and started cursing at the guy behind him.

"You f*cking kicked my seat three times. Cut it the f*ck out," bearded guy said.

Behind him a much meeker blond guy sitting next to his girlfriend murmured something about it being an accident.

Collectively our eyes moved from the fighting on the screen to the fighting down below, so much more enthralled with real drama than the manufactured one on the screen. The juxtaposition a study in real life high definition.

Bearded guy said, "I'm not afraid of you," turned around and swung, landing a punch on the startled blond guy.

I mentally asked for the movie to be turned down so I could hear what was happening on the stage below me.

Blond guy pushed bearded guy--who apparently is insane--off of him, and tried to walk away, girlfriend in tow. They were gathering their stuff when bearded guy pushed blond guy really hard and then spit in his face.

The movie-watching crowded gasped.

The girlfriend led her blond, somewhat defeated boyfriend, out in front of all of us and brought back a burly usher.

In concept, what was transpiring on the screen was being mimicked down below in real-time.

The movie employee ushered out the bearded guy who suddenly lost his bravado, standing next to the massive usher. Later he returned, sheepishly, taking his front row seat.

I leaned over and told my friend, "Amazing! Life imitating art!" He agreed. The ponytailed guy just in front of us, turned and told us to "Shut the f*ck up."

They say rock music will make you aggressive and that video games can influence the impressionable to commit crimes. Apparently, watching a movie about a juiced-up wrestler will make audience members confrontational.

Maybe from now on I should stick to chick flicks.

Kelly Kreth is a malcontent that often feels trapped in a Seinfeldian Hell. She'd like people to love her for her flaws, not in spite of them. That rarely happens.

You can read more by her at: www.youmightaswell.tumblr.com
 

As we got older, Mirna would share more "Cuban" secrets with us, detailing some easy-to-use brujeria (witchcraft) that could be used for personal gain or to thwart the attempts of enemies.

Marly thought her mother was nuts, but I was fascinated. One day I went over and there were three platanos (green bananas) on her welcome mat. Upon entering I asked Mirna why she put them there. She said that they were there in the morning when she woke up and suspected that a neighbor left them there to put an evil spell on her. No matter, Mirna, explained. She knew how to combat that magic.

Marly sat on the couch rolling her eyes.

"Why not just pick them up and throw them away?" I asked, naively.

"Get this," Marly warned, before Mirna went on to explain.

Mirna said to diffuse the spell the neighbor had set to cast on her it required one to urinate on the neighbor’s doormat.

"Wait! You squatted on her doormat this morning?" I asked, incredulous.

"No, mi Niña," she replied. "I peed in a cup and then poured it there.

Well, of course.

This should have probably been enough about brujeria to last me a lifetime, but I was intrigued.

Mirna would often go to tarot card readers, and "seers."

One in particular stood out.

Marly was going through a divorce and had moved back to New Jersey to stay with her mom while she was getting back on her feet. Her mother wanted to help her get out of her funk and knew of just the person who could: A psychic named Umberto! He’d tell her what to do to make things better!

She said it takes at least six months to get an appointment, but she called in some favors so she was taking Marly next Saturday. I asked her if I was willing to pay the $60 for a reading, if Umberto would fit me in.

"Claro," Mirna said, the plan set.

Umberto lived in East Harlem so after getting café con leches for the road, we huddled into the car for the long ride.

We finally pulled up to a generic apartment building in an urban area. Kids screamed and played in the street and as we entered, the smell of mojito and lechon permeated the building.

Mirna walked through the open apartment door and quietly sat on a couch as if entering a church. Marly and I followed, squishing in together to fit. There were two other older Hispanic women–viejas–sitting on chairs across from us, one holding a huge box that appeared to move on it’s own. It’d inch it’s way a few inches to the left and the woman would kick it back.

Beyond that, there was a lot to take in.

There was a huge parrot, sitting cageless in the middle of the room, shitting on everything. The couch was covered in birdshit and the smell in the place nauseated me.

The worst part were the hundreds of roaches crawling everywhere. A huge one scurried up the back wall behind the sofa. A few smaller ones scuttled past the parrot who cawed loudly. I kept my purse in my lap and my flip flopped feet off the floor as much as I could.

"What the fuck?" I whispered to Marly.

"You wanted to come…" she replied.

Mirna acted like nothing was wrong. The smell of death, urine and garbage didn’t affect her at all, and I was mortified.

It would be a long wait, Mirna explained, the older women were next and were there for a very serious matter. So serious, they were required to bring a live chicken–that was clearly not happy to be in that box–to sacrifice.

"You have to be kidding me?" I asked.

Marly just shook her head, welcoming me to her world.

I could see Umberto, turbaned, wearing a dirty wife beater and boxer shorts, sitting at a table in the kitchen. Umberto was gesticulating frantically and it was apparent he was a very flamboyant gay man. (Mirna explained later he only dated overweight white men.)

A woman sat across from him. He laid tarot cards on the table and spoke to her in hushed tones. I could see roaches crawling all over the kitchen floor and over the woman’s shoe.

I started scratching and getting some hives from panic. I could not sit here amidst bugs and chicken killing.

Mirna started speaking in Spanish to the two old women and they explained that she was next for her reading and that they were to kill the chicken in the bathtub after we leave.

It was kind of a relief knowing I wouldn’t have to be around for the slaughter and that I’d get my fortune read quicker than I expected, but still, the roaches were crawling way too close for comfort–one got on the couch and burrowed under the cushions we were sitting on—and I jumped up and decided pacing was a better use of my time.

Mirna gave besitos (kisses) to Umberto and listened to him list all his problems before they settled down to the reading. He wouldn’t allow us to sit in the kitchen with her, so Marly and I paced in the living room trying to avoid the hundreds of roaches (and other assorted bugs) in the room.

I really had to use the bathroom and so did Marly. It had been a long ride and those cafe con leches were grande. We walked through the living room, the parrot chasing after us screeching, and discovered the bathroom had no door!

The bigger problem was that there were roaches on the ceiling that kept falling down. There was no way either of us were going to drop our pants in front of everyone else in the apartment and risk having roaches land on us. Still, nature was calling and was just getting louder and louder.

Finally Marly told her mother she was going out for a few minutes to smoke a cigarette. We went into the alley adjacent to the building and Marly asked me to be the lookout so she could pee.

Normally I’d be appalled, but I did so gladly, knowing she’d do the same for me in a few minutes.

I couldn’t believe I was about to take my pants down in broad daylight with playing children just a few feet away. On top of that, the building that faced the alley had open, mainly curtain less windows.

I finally squatted, bare-assed and let loose. The urine got on my flip flopped feet, but I knew there was no way I could go back into that bathroom.

By the time we got back into the apartment it was Marly’s turn to go. She laid her $60 down and Umberto started chanting.

Mirna plopped back on the sofa, no doubt killing a few hundred roaches that had set up camp there, and told me about how Umberto was known to speak in tongues.

At this point I was beyond traumatized. The chicken in the box was unrelenting and was trying to peck its way out.

There were little holes in the cardboard now, and every now and then I’d see a beak. The parrot was also pecking feverishly at the outside of the box trying to get in, in what was either a show of solidarity with the other bird or a way to add insult to injury to it.

Mirna went on to tell me that Umberto was always very special and always had visions.

I asked her about the roaches and she said he has his eyes trained on the future and not the present. That mundane tasks like cleaning and bug-killing were not of any concern.

I couldn’t believe I was trapped here and wanted to leave more than anything, but I had tagged along and it would have been rude of me to insist we leave, when Mirna had so graciously allowed me to join.

Meanwhile, it was clear Marly was moved by what Umberto was telling her. She had tears in her eyes as she flipped cards over. He started shouting and even though I speak Spanish, I couldn’t understand.

Mirna explained he was warding off a spirit that was threatening to take over his body.

Finally Marly’s reading was over and before she could tell me what she was told, I was summoned. In broken English Umberto commanded me to cut the cards. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to tell him the reason I was there or explain what exactly I was hoping to know about my future, but Umberto didn’t seem to want to know.

As he began laying down cards, eyebrows raised, roaches crawled on the table and over them. I stood up and started screaming and he looked at me like I was crazy. He flicked them off the table—mere inches away from me–and told me to sit and stop being silly. That they were there to protect us.

"The parrot too?" I asked.

"No, she is the Devil, but we must know the Devil in order to recognize God."

Deep!

As he turned over cards he explained to me that the big problem was my mother. That a darkness had overtaken her.

He had no idea who I was or anything about my family. Yet I was pretty surprised when he explained my mother’s schizophrenia very accurately.

He went on to tell me that when women become pregnant they are very vulnerable because they open in a way to allow another soul to infiltrate them. And while my soul was good and normal, another evil soul also entered my mother and from the time she became pregnant she began to be what doctors would describe as mentally ill.

He said that was the ignorant’s explanation, but in reality she was overtaken by a demon and would have that demon in her for life. No amount of sacrificed animals would release her from its grasp, but that I could cleanse myself of the effects if I wanted to.

I was very surprised at how spot on he was in his assessment, especially because there was no way he could have known anything about my upbringing.

He said I was prone to dark moods, not because of a spell or bad spirits, but because of empathy from seeing my mother overcome by the evil one.

Sounded right to me.

He said I should get a big raw steak and wash myself from head to toe making sure there was blood touching every bit of me. He said to stand like this until the blood dried on my skin and into my hair.

I asked if there was another way. The thought of raw meat and blood touching me was nauseating.

He gave me a firm no, took my $60 and told me it’d be a hard life if I didn’t. Further, he said that if I didn’t do it now, the sadness would be forever ingrained in me.

Shaken from his words, the filth and smell, I nearly collapsed, drained, into the back seat of the car as we made our way home.

Marly explained that Umberto was on the mark about a pregnancy she had had and terminated years before and it made her very sad. He said the spirit was now still amongst us on Earth but tortured.

He told her in order to release it she must bring a chicken and be prepared to slit it’s throat in his bathroom and smear its blood on herself.

A vegetarian, she knew she couldn’t do this.

Mirna said she had to pee again on the neighbor’s welcome mat to offensively block any other displays of aggression the neighbor might be contemplating.

I never did rub that raw steak on myself, and on days of tears and ennui, I often wonder if my life would be different if I had.

Kelly Kreth is best known for being fired quite publicly for keeping a *gasp* blog. She chronicles the mishaps and woes of a single woman trying to get and keep the Big Three in NYC: a job, an apartment and a relationship. Kreth has also written a Sex/Relationship column for the New York Press aptly called, "Outside the Box." She is a frequent guest blogger at www.mikealvear.com. She was a 2009 Moth GrandSlam Storytelling competition finalist and often feels trapped in a Seinfeldian Hell.

The entrance fee was $130 per couple; a couple may bring an extra girl for $30. One enters into a wood-paneled room that was somewhat a cross between your uncle’s basement and the Elks lodge. I am not sure if I imagined it or not–the night was rather surreal–but I think there was a deer head over the entrance.

To the right of the entrance was a small dance floor surrounded by leather couches. No one was dancing, but there was a lone, fat, and very naked man sweatily sticking to the leather couch, smoking. I bummed a cigarette off of him. It helped. I took long, harsh drags and blew them out in the most masculine way possible. Oddly it was a Parliament 100, extra long. I sat there smoking, sitting next to my friend who went with me, the trooper that he is. We tried to make small talk about how it felt like we were on a cruise ship waiting to play shuffleboard, but everyone was naked. Or like we were in the Port Authority, but everyone was naked. Or in Atlantic City, but everyone was nak…I surmise you sense a theme.

Across, there was one boxy TV hoisted up on the ceiling that played bad porn. It was truly the place time forgot; even the porno mag on the coffee table opposite the couches was from March ’05.

To the left was the “buffet” area. I use this term very loosely. There were Chips Ahoy cookies in Tupperware (I ate two), Pringles out of their cans in piles and Cheese Doodles covered in Sarah Wrap. I didn’t get close enough to inspect the hot food, but there was an overwhelming scent of Chinese food wafting through the place. Oh, but that certainly wasn’t the only scent. The best part was the sign I was frantically trying to figure out a way to steal: LOWER TORSO MUST BE COVERED IN FOOD AREA.

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While on the couches, still not ready to disrobe and don towels to enter the den of flesh, I noticed a young black couple. Neither were anything I would call stunning or even noteworthy, but in a sea of 50-something, 200+ pounders, they were what I would consider passable. I mentioned to my friend that the black guy looked like he might have a big cock and that I hoped we would get to see them fuck later. My friend agreed that so far they were the ‘best in show.’

Not that I had any plans to do anything even remotely sexual. I was there for entertainment—I do this shit so you don’t have to, loyal readers.

Another Dixie cup of club soda that I tried to conjure into vodka and I had the courage to go to the locker room.

The rule at the Ole Trapeze is that couples need to stay together; locker access can only be obtained with both members present. Another rule is that to enter any of the mattress areas or smaller sex rooms, you must not be wearing street clothes. Towels are provided; shoes are prohibited. I demurely went into the restroom to change from my dress to a pilled blue towel. I reconciled the fact that my normally pristine feet would be trampling over some pretty unpleasant bacteria. Probably the hardest thing to reconcile about the whole outing was that the place had carpeting.

Scope on the sink counter. More Dixie cups. Condoms.

The stalls were occupied and I started to giggle because there was a woman in there taking a mean shit. The ridiculousness of the whole experience hit me. I was standing in a sex club surrounded by past middle-aged fraus in leopard muumuus and there was a woman taking a full-on shit while I was mentally sanitizing my bare feet.

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At first it felt like being the wallflower at the prom. I have known this feeling all too well. I grew up ugly. Thick welfare glasses, a big nose and horrible teeth. My own prom, a complete study in disaster. Thankfully, I felt far less naked now than I did then, even though I had been ensconced in taffeta and tulle. Despite my mockery I was enjoying myself.

Now, I merely felt overly white and tugged nervously at my towel–damn having huge tits. My friend, on the other hand, sauntered about naked feeling like he owned the place. I gave him a disapproving look, like the one he gives me when he catches me smoking a cigarette. We all have our breaking points.

We gingerly walked into the mattress room. Typically I fear laying on strange mattresses–in hotels particularly–because of the fear of bedbugs. Fearing bedbugs would have been a treat at this point. Torn condom wrappers dot the surface, little metallic stars in a sky of blue bed sheets. One must seek poetry and beauty in the oddest of places in this world. My friend and I sat in the corner to watch. I was taken with the fact that the sex was so quiet. Three couples fucking each other, the middle couple and end couple occasionally reaching over to touch each other.

I don’t like quiet sex. In fact, in porn I need there to be dirty talk. And not contrived dirty talk, but the real ridiculous stuff that spurts out of your mouth without thinking. The stuff that would sound utterly asinine if you said it without a dick and a cunt touching.

The quiet upset me. I stared for a while, but seeing obscenely fat people fuck just didn’t seem better than staying home and watching America’s Most Wanted.

The club has been around for over fifteen years. I began to realize that the original hip swingers that pioneered it are still the ones going. I suddenly felt a part of old NY sex history. All those smells engrained in walls; grey-haireds possibly thinking of their more vivid days.

There was also an overwhelming smell of–not necessarily sex–but body odor. Some people smelled sweaty, but that isn’t exactly what I mean. The whole place just smelled unbearably human.

We wandered to the other mattress room–more of the same. I asked my friend to rub my back, legs, arms–he refuses to touch feet—to relax me. I decided that it would have been easier for me to relax had I been there with a real date. Someone I could playfully blow or bite. Going to a sex club with ‘just a friend’ is like being at a whorehouse with your father. It is just too incongruous.

But onward we went. Upward too.

PLEASE WIPE DOWN EQUIPMENT WHEN FINISHED

Up a spiral staircase there were a series of small rooms where one could peek in and watch people fucking, licking, picking their noses (just kidding about the last one). Sometimes we saw a couple doing it doggie style, sometimes five or six bodies piled on top of each other, genitals and mouths touching in complicated configurations. Made me think about geometry.

Amongst the series of rooms there was an odd contraption not unlike a gynecological table. No one used it the whole time I was there, but I thought there should be another sign–much like the ones you see in gyms–alerting ‘guests’ to please wipe down the machinery after they are done.

As another aside, I commented to my friend I’d love to work there. I could definitely take on a night job. I’d get to sport a Le Trapeze shirt and either man the locker room or bar area. I would wait until I was one of the gang and then subtly suggest to the owners they create a Twister room. I’m just sayin’…

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The highlight of the evening was watching a glistening black man (not the one I mentioned earlier) fuck a light-skinned girl while another very big woman looked on and invited passersby in. She was like, “Yo, this is the real shit.” What was particularly titillating was that he wasn’t using the standard Trapeze-issued condoms. My man had a box of Magnum XLs with him. Having had personal experience with the Magnum XL, I can attest to the fact that that was the ‘real shit’ indeed! They were grunting and he was on top of her so all I got to see was his ass moving up and down. I wanted to instruct him to flip the bitch over so I could see his cock. You don’t tease a voyeur with Magnums and then don’t show the goods.

Soon the grunts died down and his partner asked rather incredulously, “Why’d you stop?” He pulled it out and there was a shot glass full of cum in the condom. “Because I came,” he said matter-of-factly. Show over. Body odor started.

My friend meandered away and headed down the staircase. All alone in the hall, still peeking my head in staring at the black guy, someone grabbed my ass and not just my ass but stuck his hand over the towel between my legs. I turned around with my best “No Thank You” face on and he said, “You should definitely come join us.” Apparently my “No Thank You” face wasn’t working. I smiled and said, “I can’t do that.”

You are told beforehand by staff that you should never feel pressured into anything. You should not touch unless you ask first. Begging is permitted; aggression is not. You are instructed to simply say “No thank you” if asked to participate in something you are not into.

I made a mental note to keep my eye on him to not be waylaid by a hand-to-crotch swipe again. But the big problem is that without clothes people begin to look the same. Bodies become blurred. I tried to keep track of who was who by their dick size, tattoos, nail polish color, and amount of pubic hair they sported. Surprisingly, there was little pubic hair to find which was definitely a plus. I had suspected there’d be many a’bush around, but even the older men were totally shaven.

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Again in the mattress room–by this time it was extremely crowded–we took “our” corner. In the sex club you really don’t want to put your back up against anything that isn’t a wall. My friend was getting frustrated because he wanted to get blown. I told him he could be free to third wheel it on any couple he wanted. I was fine watching him fuck and suck anonyJerseyans.

More and more people swarmed in. The air was moist, all around skin was dewy and my friend told me at this point his primary objective was to make sure his feet didn’t touch another guy’s.

I leaned my head against the mirrored wall and glanced at the list of upcoming events. Apparently there is to be one on July 4th. The Halloween one sounds like it would be the most fun, but the thought of the one on Thanksgiving made me want to slit my wrists. Having no family, I typically spend it alone or with friends, feeling displaced, but the thought of spending it with a group of naked strangers bloated with cranberries and nog made me want to cry. If I ever get an acting audition and need to prove to the caster I can cry on the spot, that is so going to be my mental go-to scenario.

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PLEASE THROW TRASH IN PROPER RECEPTACLES 5/29/2007

I wanted to leave; I sensed my friend wanted to stay. Yet, I think we were both waiting for that moment when we felt we were really there–something quintessential–some sort of interaction or participation. I came, I saw, I was conquered….

And then we saw them. The original black couple we agreed were ‘best in show,’ this time disrobed. Imagine our surprise when they huddled into our corner next to us. Oh kids, it was on.

Giddy and panicked I did what I do in all nerve-wracking situations: I make lists in my head and get controlling. I was also still mentally sanitizing my feet.

We shook hands; intros all around. Her name was LaToya; his was Hector. We soon found out from her–she was such a sweetie–that they were a newly engaged couple from FL on vacation. Apparently they frequent these sorts of places in their slit of the woods.

I explained that my friend and I were merely friends. We were met with looks of confusion and dare I say, judgment? We suddenly both felt the chill of embarrassment. Like we were freaks for coming to the sex club only as friends.

“So you guys have never done it?” she asked incredulously.

She leaned over and whispered in my ear, “My boyfriend saw you when you walked in. He said you were the hottest girl here. That is why we are here–for you.”

Now I was the one who was beginning to smell so very human. What now?

I explained to her that I was here just for my friend. That I only like to watch. She relayed that to Hector who was having none of that. There was a whole negotiation process about to go down. I had never negotiated in a towel before.

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I quickly explained that my friend was totally into her. She nuzzled over to me. So I did what anyone would do in that situation–I resorted to lesbianism.

“So would you kiss me?” I asked her.

I didn’t have to wait for a verbal answer.

Pillowy lips, soft and probing tongue. I was liking this. I closed my eyes tight to ward out the mirrors and flesh.

“Now kiss him,” I demanded, pointing to my friend.

We rearranged positions so my friend and LaToya could sit next to each other and further down the row I was next to Hector.

Hector took off his towel and began caressing his dick. It wasn’t fully hard and was smaller than I expected. But then again, show-ers/growers, et.al.

We leaned in and kissed. Very aggressively. My head hurt this whole weekend from his massive hand in my hair pulling, like a gardener extracting weeds. He tasted of alcohol, which seemed foreign in a place like this, so very artificial. I pulled back and he yanked me in closer, harder. He started touching my tits over the towel. Pinching. I pulled away trying to explain that I just.could.not.have.sex.with.him. That it had nothing to do with him personally but that I was merely there for my friend. He looked angry. He stuck his tongue back in my mouth and did something that truly has always nauseated me—the tongue flick. Are there really any women out there that get turned on by a guy who flicks your tongue alluding to oral sex? I have always found it repulsive.

Clearly they were there for him to bust a nut. There was no way he was going to be okay with his girl blowing or fucking my friend while he had to sit by and twiddle his thumbs. Talk about an awkward situation.

So he leaned over to LaToya explaining the situation and I had 6 eyes on me begging me to relent. I was a cog in the sex wheel.

I just couldn’t.

I moved back to my original position next to my friend, my stomach tight, my nerves shot. My friend implored me to just blow the guy.

My comfort is non-negotiable.

So there we were, in two huddled masses, feeling uncomfortable.

As LaToya spoke to Hector she rubbed my leg getting higher and higher under the towel. Had scary Hector not been there I would have relaxed. She was soft and sweet. I was fine with her. They inched closer, still trying to convince me.

Finally I stood up and said I was out of there. My friend left too, disheartened.

Apparently I put the cockblock on three people. I was actually a bit proud of myself.

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Back together in the locker room this time I pulled off my towel in public and threw on my dress, glad it smelled familiar and safe, like me.

My friend was annoyed but said, “Good job, Kelly. You did just fine.”

I smiled meekly.

Before leaving I filled a Dixie cup with Scope and tried to rinse the night out of my mouth.

On the ride home on desolate avenues–there is nothing better than the City on a late-night on a holiday weekend–I felt nauseated. It didn’t help that my friend’s car, although not new, has the perpetual scent of new car. He commented that he is sure it’ll be his demise; he is somehow contracting cancer by the chemical smell. I inhaled more deeply.

I got home and couldn’t wait to throw my dress in the wash and scrub myself in the hottest water possible in the shower. I was happy to be home; yet happier for the experience. So very happy for the familiar, but happy also for getting a taste of the unfamiliar.

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Kelly Kreth’s is best known for being fired quite publicly for keeping a *gasp* blog. Her online diary, The Unbearable Heaviness of Being, chronicles the mishaps and woes of a single woman trying to get and keep the Big Three in NYC: a job, an apartment and a relationship in NYC. Kreth has also written the Sex/Relationship column for the New York Press aptly called, “Outside the Box.”