On the snowy twilight of my Sweet 16, I twirled across a dance floor wearing a red dress that had poofy shoulders and a tight bodice. The neckline showed off my newly burgeoning chest and gave a strong hint that I’d probably need to buy some serious bras with some serious built-in underwire by that summer, but I was too busy that night to pay any attention to the changes taking place beneath my undergarments. See, I was laughing with my friends and singing along to The Cure and dancing with the boy who would be the first one to feel those newly-hatched breasts that upcoming summer while we reclined on some stranger’s front lawn. But before any adolescent groping could transpire, I had a Sweet 16 to enjoy and the events of that winter party were entirely innocent and full of real joy, marred only by the white opera gloves I wore for the entire night that made my palms so sweaty that I left little marks on the shoulders of the people I danced with.
Even at sixteen I loved me a touch of the dramatic.
What I’m saying here with this Just Like Heaven-sponsored boogie down memory lane is that I know the meaning of a big day. I know how an outfit can matter and how glorious it feels when people take time out of their lives to celebrate you and that’s why I feel able to understand just how big a day it is for Tamra. No, strike that. It’s not a big day; it’s a huge day! Today she will be baptized. She will prove her commitment to God and embrace the strength religion has given her to be less of an assh*le on a moment’s notice. She will wear white and – based upon her holy decree – so will her guests. And then she will drink wine next to a gorgeous pier because that’s what she thinks Jesus would have done if he’d been born in Orange County.
Tamra is so excited, you guys. She loves the peace this process has brought to her, to say nothing of the relief she feels that soon all of her sins will be washed away in the smoothness of the water of the hotel’s swimming pool. She will be whisked away before her fingers begin to prune and then she will join her dearest friends to celebrate just how much she has pretended to change and they will toast to her divinity while out of the corners of their eyes they will keep a close watch on exactly where those Bravo cameras are pointing because these are women who know which is their good side and whether they look better in profile or straight-on in the dusky moonlight of a fancy party for the baptism of a woman who has the hardened eyes of a Satanic creature.
And let’s not pretend – not even for one single second – that any of us are surprised by the vitriol that’s about to go down at a party thrown for a religious event, okay? None of us is shocked that it’s come to this. Personally, I’m a little bit perplexed that it’s taken this long to tarnish the sanctity of something like a baptism since this franchise has already taken on everything from bullsh*t vow renewals to fashion shows held in low-rent hotel ballrooms to events for vodka that’s flavored with red velvet and tears. I guess instead of being disgusted, we should really all take a moment to appreciate just how far these women are willing to go in the name of a D-level form of fame that really should have been far more fleeting.
Helping Tamra in her quest to wash away her sins and start over is Pastor Mike, a man I’m sure means well. He’s also a man who has no idea what he’s getting into or that his newest disciple’s friends are not the type to smile and shut their mouths just because it’s Tamra’s day of reckoning. But it all starts out kind of calmly – just like tornadoes and slasher movies begin. In one limo are Terry and Heather and Meghan, the perpetual third wheel because her husband is always away. She says that his absence makes her lonely. My reaction to the same absence is a small but heady wave of euphoria wrapping me up in a big, burly hug because the only thing more scuzzy than talking about Brooks (don’t worry…we’ll get there) or even catching a glimpse of Vicki’s face is an appearance on my television screen by Jim Edmonds, the winner of The Man Who Hates His Wife the Most this season. Seeing that the guy was in competition with a man who left his wife last year and then shoved his wedding ring into the palm of his pre-teen daughter’s hand so she could tell her devastated mommy that he “didn’t want it anymore,” this has been a contentious battle, but Jim Edmonds has walked away victorious. He has shown himself to be nothing but withholding and cold and mildly terrifying during his brief moments onscreen and if nobody in Orange County is currently planning an intervention for Meghan about her marriage and her headbands, those women are slacking.
Over in another limo are David and Shannon and THEY ARE IN LOVE. That’s right: the couple who everybody counted out last season – including the husband in the equation who recently revealed that he started an affair the day Bravo cameras entered his home to capture a blissful family dynamic – is happy and committed. David even plunged his hand right up his wife’s ass earlier that day to fish out what might be left of a colonic and if that doesn’t say devotion, I don’t know what does. Here’s the absolute truth, though: I am genuinely happy for Shannon. I might have called her insane in the past (you know, because she acted like an insane person who might have greatly benefited from ingesting some real drugs while locked in a room with plush and padded walls) and I might have stated in writing that her marriage appeared to be a f*cking mess (you know, since every frame of film shown to us illustrated that her marriage was a f*cking mess), but I can’t help the fact that I kind of like her. She’s like a holistic version of a zany character from a 1930s screwball comedy. If I believed in sh*t like reincarnation, I’d bring Claudette Colbert back from the grave this f*cking second so she could play Shannon in The Shannon & David Story: F*ck Us Being Part of That 72% Divorce Rate! God, I wish I could make such a thing happen. Do you think Pastor Mike can lead a séance when he’s done with Tamra?