by Christopher Ashlock

Many will deny it, ignore it, even say it isn’t so. But they’re wrong. Because it’s true: the new normal is the abnormal. Always has been. And if you don’t believe me, then here, allow me to explain.

The renowned mathematician Albert Einstein, who couldn’t resist a good deal, pawned his Nobel Prize for a silver mustache comb, and a couple of sauerkraut sandwiches.

And picture this: Jane Austen chewed toenail clippings as she wrote Pride and Prejudice. A source of inspiration, she said. But if it weren’t for the quick thinking of her father, George Austen, who used fishing line and a rusty hook to dislodge a gnarled nail from her esophagus, Elizabeth Bennett and Mr. Darcy would’ve never met. “Sometimes,” Mr. Austen said, shaking his head, “people do the strangest things without rhyme or reason.”

One strange thing that did not have any rhyme or reason was Harry Houdini’s fascination with butter. On the night before performing his Chinese Water Torture Cell escape, he’d bathe in a tub filled to the brim with goat milk butter, submerged like he was buried in wet sand, sometimes spending hours in it, under the superstition if he did not, he would, ultimately, fail at his great feat and drown.

While filming Jailhouse Rock, Elvis Presley would only masturbate while wearing white socks.

Elizabeth Taylor spent hours standing hunched over in front of the TV, ironing the newspaper, all because she was afraid of the germs. Dressed in a floral nightgown, red lipstick, and pearls, she’d stare down at the warm and wrinkle-free Helvetica typeset, counting the minutes before she could grip the sanitary pages in her hands. One particular Sunday morning, while spending a summer weekend in Kennewick, WA, she ironed the obituaries too long, which soon ignited, causing a great fire that burned down the lavish Columbia Hotel. Fire inspectors blamed the fire on faulty wiring. Outdated and too old, they said.

Only if they knew.

The great researcher Jane Goodall, squatted among chimpanzees Fifi and David Greybeard in Tanzania, shoving bananas into her pie hole, peel and all. This, however, wasn’t mentioned in her thesis.

Andy Warhol was a kleptomaniac. Suffered from an intense hankering for shoplifting soup cans from supermarkets. The night he died, he admitted he loved Tomato Bisque more than painting.

Here’s a fact: at the onset of her menstrual cycle, Cleopatra would yearn for the taste of sand. It was an oddity she couldn’t explain nor deny. Her stomach became a human hourglass, dispensing her life, one grain at a time.

Paul Bunyan, the lumberjack, had a fear of oral infection. Gingivitis, Hand-Foot-Mouth disease, thrush . . . these all struck fear into the great giant. Babe the Blue Ox, bewildered by the whole ordeal, gazed on in boredom in the forests of Canada as Paul swung his mighty ax, dropping towering trees, one after another, which he dragged to his lumber mill, where he made a surplus of toothbrushes, toothpicks, dental floss. Babe, he said, in a lecturing tone as he wiped sawdust from his beard, gum disease is no laughing matter. Cancer, respiratory issues, memory loss. You need to take oral hygiene more seriously.

Not long after, a tree fell on him.

Paul Bunyan died instantly.

Madonna was deathly afraid of being flat chested. Teased as a child, she grew up believing she’d rather have cone-shaped breasts than no breasts at all. Who knew?

The Tooth Fairy, strangely enough, fashioned assorted jewelry made from the rotten incisors of children. Primarily, she sold her items on EBay and Amazon and few obscure boutiques in Paris and Milan. It was her passion, her hobby, a way to make a few extra bucks, but once the Better Business Bureau discovered her sick and unusual practices, her company was sued and forced to shut down. She was sad. Devastated. But it didn’t take long before she got the itch. Just outside Queens she began selling tooth-jewelry from the trunk of her VW Beetle, and not surprisingly, got busted, again. Currently, she’s doing five to ten at Sing Sing. And rumor has it she could get released next summer on good behavior.

Before he addressed the nation, Richard Nixon would snack on his own boogers. Played it off like they were gum, or mints. No one ever questioned it.

Fidel Castro admitted, while interrogating a prisoner, that he eats ice cream with a fork. Likes how the coldness hits both the roof of his mouth and his tongue. Double the flavor. No metal taste. The prisoner was executed an hour later.

The year 1810 was the winter of doubts. Napoleon Bonaparte firmly believed no one would take him seriously on account of his height. He desired to be taller. And calcium was the key, he thought. Before battle, many of his soldiers would find him on some farm, kneeling in the snow, lips clasped tightly around the udder of a French dairy cow, sucking and chugging, trying to extract as much milk as possible. He yearned for the taste of milk, the nutrients, the calcium. To be taller. A real man. Napoleon was 5 feet 6 inches when this all began, and wasn’t any taller or shorter when he died.

Ironically, Clyde Kent was claustrophobic. Every time he saw his brother rush into a phone booth, he’d cringe, hyperventilate, and suffer a mild seizure. Clyde never saved a single person.

Monica Lewinsky considered herself a musician. Prided herself on the ability to play the most distinguished organ, been around since the dawn of man, made of flesh, muscle, blood flow. The Yo-Yo Ma of the Trouser snake, they said. Whenever she performed fellatio she was convinced she could harness the power of a nation, change the world, touch lives, while making the most beautiful music man has ever heard, by simply pursing her lips and blowing. Bill swore he had visions of double rainbows, unicorns, even heard the sound of a thousand humming birds, hovering, flapping their wings in perfect harmony. He’d smile his tired smile. Unfortunately, this was her only performance of record.

Bonnie and Clyde’s almost love child, spoke in a British accent, even though he was one-third American and two-thirds criminal.

Among his many quirks, Harry Potter played Quidditch only because of the thrill of hard wood between his legs. No he wasn’t gay, or bi, or curious, he simply liked the possible danger of splinters imbedded in his femoral artery.

Jane Barnell (more commonly known as the bearded lady or Lady Olga) invented No Shave November. In need of a quick buck, she quit her duties on her grandmother’s farm, grew a fetching beard (which oddly enough was her only true talent), and joined the Ringling Brothers circus in Germany. Upon discovering Jane’s new line of work, she grew heartbroken, melancholy. Never gonna find a man with that, she said, referring to her dark, prominent whiskers. Toward the end of her career, to her mother’s surprise, she married Thomas O’Boyle, who didn’t mind the freakish facial hair, as he actually complimented it by saying, I’m quite fond of it. I find it comforting, warm, and… cozy.

     Donald Trump’s first wife liked to pop other people’s pimples. Blackheads were her favorite.

     Unlike her brother, Paula Hitler collected earwax in a mason jar. She hid it on the highest shelf in her closet, next to her leather suitcases and personal autographed copy of the Mein Kampf, and told any one who stumbled upon the jar that it was nothing more than honey. A treasure trove of tawny, crusted cerumen, she would whisper before tightening the lid and locking it away. Imagine the surprise when one morning, the Hitlers gathered around the kitchen table for breakfast, and devoured a bag of fresh, warm baguettes smeared with what they thought was honey. Of course they yelled sheisse! (shit!), blamed the whole damn ordeal on the Jews, and sent Paula into a panic. Ten and a half years of accumulation had all been for not. She eventually gave up, found a new hobby by turning her attention to bellybutton lint.

Einstein. Goodall. Hitler. Were their quirks, their odd behaviors, no different than the rest of the world? Or did they simply not care? Okay with the idea they’re eccentrics, deviants, kooks. And didn’t coil and cower at the notion of their freak flags flapping proudly through the air, exposed and vulnerable, to be seen by the whole world.

And what about Da Vinci? Malcolm X? Oprah? Never mind that: what about you? What do you do that’s so unusual? So queer? Do you count steps? Detest square burger patties because they’re bad fast food feng shui? Flush the commode before finishing? Ponder that. Ask yourself that. And I promise, the answer will rouse you.