Desiree Burch

I am not some other girl. I am Desiree Burch. I have spent my life laughing like a bicycle horn. I am built like a small tree. My hair grows up toward the sun. People like to agree with me, because I am most often saying yes. I believe in yes. No is terribly drab. I grew up in Southern California, in a sorry, suburban-ass place, that remains with me in artistic action and reaction. I lived through a series of best friends and prime-time television shows until (and I guess maybe through) my sophomore year. Then I joined the caravan of drama geeks, and discovered I was a social genius. Finally, rose-tinted glasses in the right prescription. I decided that I didn’t want to know the same people I grew up with, and went off to Yale. Majored in theater, and minored is what David Sedaris would refer to as “Bong Studies.” But then again, I am definitely not running for office anytime soon. It was here that I picked up a penchant for foie gras, surrealism, wearing daring coats and surrounding myself with throngs of gay men. I say, you only get one shot: live decadently! By the time I graduated, I was too broke to move home, so I lived off lots of lovely floors and futons around New York City. Now I live in Queens. So we’re movin’ on up. If I made a million dollars tomorrow, I wouldn’t move. Thanks to some deep-seated Bob Vila-like skill, my room has become my rose—I have tamed it. So now you know: I am both funny ha-ha and funny strange. Which makes me inclined toward things like writing, acting, solo performance and stand-up comedy. Which is what I do, when I’m not all over NYC, stickin’ the truth all up in your face. One day I’ll be deified. Already, I am a woman, and an Aquarius, which is close. I only hope the world can covet me for all that I am worth. I want sobbing at my wedding and laughing at my funeral. Okay, maybe it all doesn’t have to be that absurd. A Dixieland-style procession through Central Park is fine.