Transcript: "Strip Club of My Own Making", a Story By Matthew Dicks

This is a transcript of Matthew Dicks's story, Strip Club of My Own Making, at a Moth GrandSLAM. You can watch Matthew telling the story here:

It’s 1991. I’m 20 years old, and I’m working at a McDonald's in Milford, Massachusetts. I’m flipping burgers, and my boss, Pam, comes, takes me by the arm, and pulls me into the walk-in cooler. She says she has to ask me a question.

Now, Pam is a 40-something mother of three who desperately wants to be 20 again. She’s the woman who buys us beer but brings the kegs to the party in hopes that we will allow her to stay at the party and party with us.

So, Pam looks at me and says, “Lisa is getting married.” Lisa’s a woman we work with, and Pam says, “I want to have a bachelorette party here in McDonald's for her.” I nod, because I don’t actually know what a bachelorette party is, so it sounds fine. But I don’t know what she’s about to ask me.

She puts her hand on my shoulder and says, “We want you to be the stripper for the bachelorette party.” Now, I say yes for two reasons. First, I’m 20, so I can only see five minutes in front of me. I don’t really know what this means. But I’m also the guy who doesn’t get girls because of the way I look. I have no game. The only move I have is proximity. I find a girl I like, and I stand next to them for as long as possible, trying to wear them down. I’m like the romance version of erosion.

And it’s worked. I’ve had girlfriends, but for the first time in my life, someone wants to see what’s under my clothes. And yes, she’s older than my mother, and yes, she’s my boss, but it’s a start. So, I’m excited.

But I ask Pam, “I don’t want to be totally naked.” She says, “We do not want you to be totally naked either. We’ll get you a thong.” I say, “Great.”

The night of the bachelorette party comes, and I show up in my uniform because that’s what she told me to wear. As I’m going into the store, I’m still excited. Again, I can only see five minutes in front of me, and I’m excited about this opportunity. I feel that way until I walk into the store and see that all the guys are working that night because the girls are in the back getting ready.

As I walk in, the guys look at me, and they have a look that I can’t quite figure out, but it is universal, and it is disconcerting. I start to think that maybe I’ve made a mistake.

I meet Pam in the back hallway where we stack the buns—the Big Mac buns and the hamburger buns—and she hands me an orange thong. She tells me to put it on and then knock on the crew room door when I’m ready.

Now, I don’t know if you know what a thong for a man looks like, but it’s essentially a plastic sandwich bag with two strings attached. As I’m putting it on, I am NOT attempting to be grandiose about my situation in any way. But Pam has not sized the thong properly. It’s like the Happy Meal version of a thong. So, as I’m putting it on, if you’ve ever tried to put something in a container and while you’re putting it in, the other side is popping out—that is the situation I’m experiencing while trying to get this thong on.

Now, I’m really feeling like I’ve made a terrible mistake. But I manage to get it on, put my pants on, and knock on the crew room door. Pam swings it open, presses play on a boom box, and Madonna’s “Lucky Star” begins to play. I think, “Good, silence is not good—music is better.”

But when I step into the crew room, I know now that this is a terrible thing. The crew room is tiny—it’s like 10 by 10—and it has a McDonald’s booth with four girls sitting in it. Then, there’s Lisa. Lisa hears the music and sees me walk in, and she realizes what’s about to happen. A look of horror falls on her, and then I have that same look because sitting next to Lisa is Alice, a 67-year-old manager who’s been like my grandmother for the last two years. She is bopping to “Lucky Star” and leaning forward. Then, there are two women on the floor sitting there because there’s no room, so they’re right here.

And now, I have to take my clothes off. So, I start with my shoes and quickly realize you cannot remove shoes in any sexy way. I’ve opted for business casual, so there are laces and black socks that come up to the knees. It’s not a pretty sight. When I take them off, I don’t know what to do with them. In a club, I might throw them, but if I threw them here, they would just clock the girl right here. So, I put them in a little neat pile by the door, ball up my socks, and put them in.

Then, I take my shirt off, but I forget that the sleeves have buttons. So, I’m in this reverse position and can’t get it off. I have to put the shirt back on to unbutton the sleeves so I can get it off. Then it’s time to take off my pants. That’s going to be the easiest—just undo the belt, and they will fall. But it’s the hardest thing. I wait for a minute, praying that the world will end, that some apocalypse will wipe us all out, and I won’t have to go forward. But that doesn’t happen. The world spins on, and so I drop my pants. I realize right away that this thong is fine because when my pants fall, everything in my body sucks in, and there’s room for like three of me in this thong now.

And “Lucky Star” is still playing, and Pam is hooting and Alice is bopping. I realize I have to dance. I just kind of do this, and I make eye contact because I feel that’s appropriate—that I’m supposed to be doing that. For a moment, I’m so happy that I’m me and not them because they have to look at this, and I only have to look at them. Then, the song ends, and I have all my clothes neatly piled in the corner. I collect them, retreat back to the hallway, get dressed again, and I’m thinking in my head, “That probably wasn’t a good thing that just happened.”

As I’m leaving, I pass by Brian, who’s at the fryer, and he’s shaking his head. I’m like, “What?” And he says, “I can’t believe you did that. When they asked me, I said no way.” And I realize that wasn’t the first choice. Later on, I find out that I’m not the second, third, or fourth choice either.

It’s really dumb to be upset that you were not the first chosen for a striptease in a McDonald's crew room for a bachelorette party for women 20 years older than you and more. But, like, it hurt. There’s a time when you just want to be the person who people look at and think you’re the good-looking one, or you’re a good-looking one. And that’s what I wanted that night, and I didn’t get it.

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