>You Will Be Mine, Mojo. Oh Yes, You Will Be Mine.

>For some reason, I’m always Krogering when I see him: a middle aged man with black combat boots, black t-shirt, black jacket, black jeans, black hair… Oh come on, you know who I’m talking about, right? How many people over 30 in my suburbiest of suburbs fit this description? Only one.

Cinderella. Live and in Bellevue.

Ordinarily, the sight of an 80s superstar would fill me with the urge to squeal and maybe even demand that he sign my boob, but Cinderella’s become something of a thorn in my side. We have a history, you see- I mean, he doesn’t actually know we have a history, but that’s beside the point.

Last summer, I wrote in the Nashville Scene about my attempts to make contact with Cinderella. Let’s just say it didn’t go well. It was disappointing, I’ll admit, that he didn’t spot me and immediately beg me to be his groupie or, better yet, his metal muse, but even worse was the callous manner in which he caused me to realize that I’d lost some of the daredevilishness that marked my younger years. Since then, I’ve decided that Cinderella is the only man alive who can bring back my mojo. All I have to do is utter the magic words, “Don’t know whatcha got ’til it’s gonnnne” in his presence (and play a riff or two on my air guitar) and bam, I’ll be a hellion once more.

So when I saw him getting gas at the Kroger fuel station, I took a deep breath and prepared to belt out the words, holding my gas nozzle like a microphone.

“Don-,” I croaked.

At that moment, a woman got out of the passenger side of Cinderella’s truck. A woman with purple streaks in her hair and tattoos. Lots of tattoos. Hearing the first note to her driver’s megahit coming out of my mouth, she looked over at me suspiciously. I gulped and began coughing. I didn’t want to mess with this woman. She was little, but looked like she packed a mean punch. Imagining my impending black eye, I coughed harder and leaned up against the gas pump for added realism. Satisfied by my performance, she got back in the truck.

Damn, I thought to myself. I could’ve totally taken her if I didn’t have on these stupid silver sequined wedges. I swore darkly that the next time Cinderella and I met, things would be different.

I saw him again when I was nine months pregnant and waddling around the grocery with a list that said something like, Potato chips, Ice cream, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Ice Cream. When I spotted Cinderella coming down the aisle alone, I knew what I had to do. Taking a deep breath, I headed straight for him. At first, I said nothing. Better to size up the situation before I leapt into a performance. He wore a bored expression as he picked through the selection of canned baked beans. These are okay, I imagined he was thinking, but they’re nothing compared to the baked beans I ate after appearing as a guest on Headbanger’s Ball.

I cleared my throat hopefully as I boom-ba-ba’ed by, but he didn’t look up. Undaunted, I resolved to do my song and air guitar bit as soon as I passed him again.

We met again in condiments and this time, I was ready. As he pushed his cart toward me, I headed his way with steely resolve, willing him to make eye contact. Just as we met in front of the mayo, his gaze met mine. A million things resulted from the electricity of that moment: a planet exploded in the next galaxy, an opossum wandering across the Natchez Trace Parkway mysteriously dropped dead before being hit by an oncoming Geo Prizm, and in Malaysia, a man’s eardrum spontaneously burst. I was feeling it. I was ready. I stopped my cart and turned to face him.

“Don’t know-” I began in a screechy falsetto, my fingers clawing at an air guitar.

“What?” he said sharply, breaking the spell.

“Don’t knowww-,” I tried again. He stared at me, a nine-months pregnant woman clawing the air and inexplicably yowling. I froze, bewildered and unsure of what to do next. Finally, I continued.

“Don’t know when the mayonnaise will go on sale again,” I finished, trying to cover by using the same high-pitched falsetto I’d started with.

His lip curled and he kept walking.

A lesser woman would quit, but I’m not giving up so easily. Today, I’ve had my baby, I’m 43 pounds lighter and training every night for my next Cinderella encounter by doing chinups on my door sill, shadowboxing, and jumping rope really fast while Eye of the Tiger plays in the background. Okay, so maybe not- but I do practice singing The Song sometimes in the mirror when I’m putting on mascara. Let there be no doubt, I’m going to sing it and he’s going to listen and that’s all there is to it.