A Contest You Don't Want To Win
Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Roberta Miles

A Contest You Don't Want To Win

For all you know the person next to you has more shit in their life than you do, or me. And now you’re thinking, she’s wrong! I have more shit than the person next sitting next to me. And is that a contest you want to win? I don’t! I don’t!

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It Was A Dream; [She] Was a Dream
Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Roberta Miles

It Was A Dream; [She] Was a Dream

And that tuft of hair on her mound of Venus that surrounded her lips and teased itself into a perfect curl with the perfect color. She was my ideal.

Then I saw my body, scarred — from the cesarean, fat, lined, wrinkled. It was mine. I heard a woman in the background say, Roberta’s breasts are too large. And it’s just not pretty.

You see, the people in my dreams talk, and they are not always kind.

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I Got My Mother Stoned and Now She is Gone
Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Roberta Miles

I Got My Mother Stoned and Now She is Gone

We sent her down to the front side walk, which was a little tricky to get to, I admit. We were hoping for pictures of all the birthday party attendees wrapped around and hanging off the railings. It took her a very long time to hit bottom. She kept stopping and yelling “Am I there yet?” 

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Crashing a Gig in a Small Supper Club
Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Roberta Miles

Crashing a Gig in a Small Supper Club

By now the piano player hates the trumpeter. The stage has become a hostile environment. Soon it will be time to wake up the bass player. I just want to get off the stage. It's my turn again. We are just about to wrap up my song and people start screaming.

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Decisions Suck: One Step Toward My Dreams and Back Again
Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Roberta Miles

Decisions Suck: One Step Toward My Dreams and Back Again

I always planned on being a singer and as it turns out I am a pretty successful jazz singer in the city. But at 18, I had decided to be an opera singer. In my search for a teacher, ballsy me, courageous me, determined me, sent a letter to Beverly Sills, one of the greatest coloratura soprano’s in the world, asking her for a voice teacher recommendation.

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I am Matisse
Fiction, Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Fiction, Roberta Miles Roberta Miles

I am Matisse

I am Matisse, and this is a kid’s story, because I am a kid. I am nine years old and very responsible for my age. The other Matisse, at least the only other one I know, was a great painter, the father of abstraction. I have decided to be empress of the universe. I’m what adults call precocious.  

My Grandma-ma always speaks to me as if I’m the smartest person she ever met. My mom still thinks of me as only nine and my dad, well he just smiles at me all the time. Actually he beams. He doesn’t say much of anything.

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Ariadne
Fiction, Roberta Miles Roberta Miles Fiction, Roberta Miles Roberta Miles

Ariadne

Ariadne, dressed sensibly. Sensible hat, sensible shoes, little white gloves, some said she was a very sensible girl. She was thirteen when all sensibility flew out the window. She laughs about it now. Those teenage years were difficult for a girl so sensible.

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