THAT TIME I WAS A BEARDED LADY
Cindy Maddera
"Let the games begin! #aidswalkopen2016"
Saturday was the AIDS Walk Open, a charity event that raises money for the Kansas City AIDS Walk. It's a great charity event that involves putt-putt and day drinking. Teams of four compete for best putt-putt score and or best dressed team or just to make it through all twelve bars without passing out on the sidewalk. Last year was Michael's first year to do the AIDS Walk Open and I think we made it to five bars before I had to scrape him off the sidewalk outside of Kelly's. Part of it was, with it being his first time, he didn't really know what to expect. This year he was prepared and ready to pace himself accordingly.
A few months back, my friend Heather (who lives in California) contacted me and said that she and her friend Michelle wanted to come up for the Open and surprise Terry. Michelle and Terry met and bonded in Italy over the summer. So Heather was like "Hey! Let's dress up and be The Terry Newells! And make Terry ugly cry with happiness!" I'm always up for making someone ugly cry with happiness. We put Heather's plan into motion. She and Michelle would be conjoined twins, the World's Only Interracial Conjoined Twins! I would be the bearded lady and Michael would be our carnival barker. Off we all scampered to start building our costumes and getting things in motion to surprise Terry. I started to put out feelers for what bar to start in and who was volunteering and who was on a team. Then Friday night, Michael and I picked up the girls from the airport, spent some time stalking Terry before surprising him at his house. Where we made him ugly cry with happiness.
Our costumes where phenomenal. The conjoined twin costume that Michelle made was so smart. They could easily unsnap themselves to make walking around easier and snap back together as twins when it was time for us to put on a show. My beard got a lot of attention and Michael was pretty much made for carnival barking. If we had made it to the last two bars in time, we would have stolen the Best Dressed Team award. We did not, but that's OK because we made it to all twelve bars! We really had only expected to make to six. Also, everyone knew we had the best costume. Terry and Heather walked up to the 303 on Monday and she said she ran into a number of people who told her that we had the best costume. I had some small talk with a woman at work yesterday who doesn't even really know me. She said "I think I saw on Saturday." I said "Was I bearded lady!?!" and she smiled and said "yeah...I had no idea what was going on." Then I got to tell her about the Kansas City AIDS Walk and how fun it is to raise money for something good.
"#aidswalkopen2016"
"#aidswalkopen2016"
We had a grand time! I am still taking donations for the Kansas City AIDS Walk! You can leave donations at https://www.aidswalkkansascity.org/cindymaddera