Tales From the DJ Booth: 12 Rules for Stripping
A few months back, I mentioned the concept of keeping one's personal life out of the club, because customers don't usually fantasize about the girl who's late on rent and has a sick dog. The “leave drama at the door” rule doesn't just apply to dancers, but to DJs, security, and bartenders as well—everyone at the strip club is playing a role, and that role is “smiling tone-setter and money-taker.” I recall an evening when I drove directly from a funeral to my shift at the club, only to be greeted by a late-to-stage, bad-tipping dancer, demanding that I play her Puddle of Staind or whatever was popular in the trailer parks at the time. So, not only did I play it, but I played that garbage loud and pretended that it was actual music. Why? Because people look at the DJ, and if the DJ (or bartender, security, etc.) is having a bad time, then he's letting others know that the whole experience is a ruse (even if it is, we try to make it look like less of one). If you find yourself naked on a stage, the last thing you want to do is remind your audience that you're a real person with real problems. Your name is “Destiny,” and you're here to party (it's not Stephanie, and you're not behind on bills).
This rule applies two ways. If leaving drama at the door is crucial to your income, the opposite also applies where peace at home is concerned: leave work at work.
Rule 8: Leave the Club at the Club
Sure, some of us degenerates don't (know if we) have kids, so extending our social circle only a few feet outside of the club's front door is an option for some of us. DJs date bartenders, who live with strippers that cheat with bouncers, who secretly sleep with cooks, and we all go to the same sketchy unoccupied office space for after-hours parties where the beer is flat, and the cocaine is weak, before returning to bed for another recharge—no hope of a “normie lifestyle” on the horizon. However, this is the exception, and not the rule.
Believe it or not, many strippers actually are paying for college. I've even met a few who paid for a house, in cash, before they turned 25, by simply avoiding the “club lifestyle” and maintaining a mostly conservative (read: married and clothed, not necessarily political) personal life with a husband named Brad and two kids with extra “eighs” in their names where a “y” should be. Suburbia awaits those who can save their earnings. Especially in Portland, there are many covert dancers whose real life involves a picket fence out front and a “yoga studio pole” in the garage.
If you, the aspiring functional member of clothed society, want to moonlight as a stripper, it's just as important to draw boundaries in your personal life as it is to keep your anonymity at the club. Your husband/wife/boo/girlfriend/boyfriend/partner doesn't need to know the nitty-gritty of what goes down at work, especially if you're not breaking any laws or couples agreements (read: you're not selling drugs or turning tricks).
Jealousy aside, there's a degree of “eww” that most people feel when we (this includes all industry staff) describe what happens at work, but this applies to most jobs where working with the public is a thing. Baristas get hit on. Nurses put their fingers in people. Politicians get bent over and fucked raw by corporate interests. There is no such thing as honest work, as even the Amish aren't safe—they know what an erect horse cock looks like, for better or worse. I've seen a lot at the clubs, but I've never seen an erect horse cock (only flaccid ones are allowed on stage per Oregon law). So, no, you being topless while a dude looks at you is no different than going to Sauvie Island for the day, except you're getting paid, and there's a bouncer who will smash face if anyone tries to touch you.
This column isn't just for strippers—no one should bring work home with them. The idea of keeping work at work isn't about hiding anything or keeping secrets; it's about not bringing problems into your house. It's literally the same respect my girlfriend gives me, when she gets off shift at her hipster bar job and doesn't go on about how the weird cook with the half man-bun and greasy smile keeps trying to win her over with tickets to Bright Eyes, and weird jabs about how being a DJ-slash-writer isn't a real job...okay, maybe she did once, but I just pretended to not know who Bright Eyes is (R.I.P. Bonnie Tyler).
Of course, do vent. Couples are stronger when they can shit talk together. If a guy at your stage said some out-of-pocket shit, share that with your hubby. Or, if there's something on the news about an incident at your club, by all means bring that up. But don't talk about how the guitarist from Dandy Warhols smells good up close (and don't ask me how I know, but he does). Don't go into detail about what “friction dances” are. Don't tell your babe about how the bouncer found your clit ring next to the stairs. Pretend you're an OBGYN for the elderly, a pet mortician, or something most people don't want to hear the details about. Don't feel any shame related to the fact you work in “the sex industry”—feel shame that you know every word to a Buckcherry song. Keep work talk funny, light, and yes, slightly negative. Work is supposed to suck. Don't make your significant other feel like they have competition at the Rusty Clam II. Even if your regulars are all super attractive dudes who make you feel like Queen of 82nd Ave, they're just customers.
Sometimes, work can be fun, and yes, certain financially lucrative situations fall into that gray area of “not quite cheating, but also sketchy if brought up,” similar to our country's relationship with Israel. If you, the family-having, normal-life-aspiring stripper, experience an awkward lap dance or get aroused when an off-duty member of Popular Band sits at your stage, that's fine. Your office worker husband has a secretary coworker, and yes, he thinks about her naked, often, especially when the copier needs paper changed, and she's wearing those cut-off jeans. Do you know your husband has eyes and a Y chromosome? Sure. But do you want to hear about how that affects his relationship with intern Jessica? No. So, just keep your work life separate from your home life, and understand that it's an issue of basic respect and tact, not dishonesty (unless he's actually banging Jessica, in which case, all bets are off and you're free to hang out with the Blazers at their hotel).
Be Catwoman (Tim Burton version). Go about your daily routine, sneak into something sexy at night, rob motherfuckers blind, and then return home without waking up your baby. Don't make “stripper” your entire personality, unless you plan on a completely fused personal-and-work lifestyle, which is totally fine (I'll see you at after hours), but not ideal for the credit-score-aspiring woman. If you run into a regular customer when you're at Winco with Brad, Breighleigh and Timeightheigh, just smile and keep it moving. Customers are (usually) equally embarrassed to be a regular at your work, so they will probably ignore you as well. Treat your shifts like Fight Club. Don't talk about them, don't go into details, and don't explain the bruises. Some of us have thigh bumps from the pole; others have corporate burnout—every job destroys you, but pole marks can heal (whereas the mental trauma of slaving to a cubicle for your entire life cannot). Most people envy independent contractors whose dress code is “nothing” and whose taxes are optional. You have the second best job on the planet, and until Weird Al retires, you should be grateful that you're not working for Amazon, let alone the fact that you're being paid to look pretty.
So, if you want to do the whole “husband and brunch” circuit, just leave your personal life at the club door, and leave the club life on the other side of that same door. Your customers don't need to know where your kids live, and your kids don't need to know that you pretend to be aroused for strangers, while Bon Jovi plays from a dusty speaker that hasn't been updated since the 1980s.
