A Dual Life: A Teacher by Day, a Burlesque Performer by Night with Sonia

Disclaimer: The episode is a tad adult in nature, so this is your warning, you might not want to listen around the kiddos. 

In this episode of 'Jacqui Just Chatters', Jacqui Lents interviews her friend Sonia, an elementary school teacher who lived a dual life as a burlesque performer. Sonia discusses the nature of burlesque, defining it as an art form with a loose rubric that's up for interpretation but, generally, a variety show. The episode covers the performer selection process, the variety of shows and performances, and how Sonia balanced her day job with this nighttime passion. There's also a discussion on how the burlesque experience helped plus-size Sonia gain self-confidence. The podcast episode takes a lighter tone too, with Sonia sharing amusing stories from her time as a performer, including a public whipping and flashing a police officer. If you need a laugh cure right now, this is your perfect medicine.

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#jacquilents #jacquijustchatters #podcast #podcaster #burlesque #drag #dragshow #performance #lgbtq+ #humor #stories #women #woman #womenempowerment #plussizebeauty #curvy #curvyconfidence #stlouis

Gracias to Carmen María and Edu Espinalfound’s song - Ratatouille's Kitchen, which made up my opening music.  Also, merci to Nesrality on Pixabay for their cover of Irving Berlin’s tune - Always (a long fav of mine) for my closing music. Special thanks to Emily Clarke for the creation of my logo.  

Music used for this episode includes

Cheating – Lemon Music Studio

So Sexy Ellis Smith Remix – AAP Official

Broadway Walk – Julius H

Big Band TV Show – Music For Videos

Richard Strauss The Blue Danube remix harmonica - Nesrality

Transcript

Sonia Final Audio Product
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Jacqui: [00:00:00] Elementary school teacher by day, burlesque performer by night. No, this is not a late night TV movie, my friends. This is the real life story of my gal pal, Sonia. She sat down with me to have a chat 

about this dual life from her  past, and to give a lesson about what is burlesque. 

The episode is a tad adult in nature, so this is your warning.

You might not want to listen around the kiddos. I hope you'll stick around for her story about a public whipping and flashing a police officer. If you need a laugh cure right now, this is your perfect medicine. Welcome to Jacqui Just Chatters. I'm happy you are joining me today. I'm your hostess, Jacqui Lents, and I'm trying to make the world a little better, one story at a time.

If you like what you hear, please subscribe. Leave a review, stars, or share with your friends. Episodes [00:01:00] come out every other Thursday, but if you can't wait that long, you can go to my website or other socials. The links are in the episode notes. Let's get chatting.

Today on Jackie Just Chatters, we've got a very entertaining guest and my dear friend, Sonya, welcome to the program. Thank you for having me. I am so excited to have you here. This is strange because normally I have guests and I'm getting to know them where I've known you for so long. This is totally going to be like having a conversation, not so much an interview.

Sonia: It is strange. Cause I feel like I, should I teeter like my professionalism or just us being silly and talking about. Not important things. I'm trying to find that voice in me. My, my actress is not knowing what the script is. I know. I know. I 

Jacqui: feel the same way. I'm [00:02:00] like, there's the podcaster and then there's just me.

There's 

Sonia: just Queen Jack. Yes. I. I completely understand. I'm struggling with that myself. 

Jacqui: So for the listeners who don't know you as intimately as I do, what is your get to know your spiel? If you're meeting somebody for the first time, what do you tell them about yourself? 

Sonia: I usually, I try not to start with my profession because you're not your profession, but usually being a teacher comes out of my mouth, usually just.

Talk about my family. Hello, my name is Sonia and I'm a part time ESL teacher and that sort of thing. But that's a hard question, honestly. And because I don't, usually when you meet somebody new, you just talk to them. And I usually try to find out more about them and see where my life. Entwines in that. So for your listeners, I know this is not , this is not the answer that you're wanting.

She collects bowls, I can tell you got that. Bowls. I don't [00:03:00] really, I would say that I am a little bit of a collector, an autumn and Christmas enthusiast, uh, a bookish gal who loves to read a good cozy mystery and think that coffee is the gift from God. That would be my, I have a wonderful partner in life who really molds our adventures and that's my world.

My world has been very simple and I enjoy that. So a slower, simpler life. Now, yes, now, because we're going to talk about our topic burlesque, not so simple and not something you would associate with teachers. No, 

Jacqui: since burlesque is our topic today. I thought it would be a good place to start, but this is such a teacher thing to do.

We're going to start with the front loading. 

Sonia: And if you define what burlesque means, what is [00:04:00] burlesque 

Jacqui: and what is it not? Because I think that's just as 

Sonia: important as what it is. I will say burlesque is basically a variety show. And when you have variety, that means that you have the loose rubric. You have a lot of different things that they may entail in my definition burlesque is a it's a an illusion or a tease with an element of vaudevillian art styles, for instance, a lot of people when they think burlesque.

It really is up to interpretation because really it is just a variety show. So a lot of people when they think burlesque, they think more of the nudity, the stripper, the, the very kind of cookie cutter stripper type. Everybody knows what I'm talking about when I say that. And, but some people also where we went with that interpretation was we wanted burlesque to be a art form and an art form with [00:05:00] representation of all.

Diverse types of body styles in ethnicities and things, that's where we went with it. And I think that's why our troop was unique because I am not the, I'm not the cookie cutter, typical looking burlesque dancer, especially at that time in the early 2000s. That's changed a lot. There's a lot more representation now 

Jacqui: that since you guys can't see her, she is a curvaceous redhead.

Sonia: I have a curve or two burlesque 

Jacqui: is not a strip show.

Sonia:  No burlesque is and there is some nudity in some burlesque shows. It's not all about you're fully clothed and then you get down to nothing, even though some of the things were like that. But in the state of Missouri, that's not legal a B. I would not be comfortable doing that to be honest.

And no judgment to anyone who does. It's just that's my personal feeling. But in the state of Missouri, you cannot show gluteal cleft. And that is the [00:06:00] phrasing for it. That's basically folks at your butt crack. And you can't, even though no one's told the plumbers of Missouri this, or you can't, uh, show you have to have something covering your nipple area, areola nipple area for many dancers that go for men too.

Um, no, it is, it is a female, so for dancers, a lot of them will put black tape or like electrical tape or something over that area to cover. If they're taking their clothes off, we, some of them make pasties. I remember many times, many evenings, I made pasties and people would say, what did you do tonight?

I'm like, Oh, I made pasties. I think they thought I meant pasties, but whatever, 

Jacqui: I like a good pasty. That, that's a Michigan treat. 

Sonia: I do too. But that's the difference I think between a strip show and burlesque.[00:07:00] 

Jacqui: Okay. So how did you 

Sonia: get involved? That's a funny story. Oh, good. I like the funny story. Gosh, I'm going to age myself. Remember my space.

So on my space, I had the profile I did like everybody else because I'm a follower. I had a profile and in the early 2000s, I was very into wigs and costuming and makeup at a costume closet. I, my, I had a lot of performers who were good friends. I had a lot of drag performers who were good friends. My roommate was a drag queen.

So we, I, I. Dabbled a lot in that art form and so those were the pictures that I would post on my MySpace just because it was it's when you're into something or it's a hobby or whatnot. That's what you like to show off to me. It makes total sense 

Jacqui: that. Recently, I have [00:08:00] gotten way more into vintage style and vintage clothes and I've, I've had some pictures.

And if you look at my website, the photos I have, they have a very vintage feel. Thankfully, listeners, you cannot see that my head is covered in foam curlers right now because I'm doing a vintage set, a wet set 

Sonia: as we talk. It's very lovely. Oh, yeah, it's my pink rollers, 

Jacqui: but I can get it because for me, in a sense, it's like I get to play dress up a little bit.

I get to, I'm, I'm creating this look it's dress up. It's just, it's fun. I get that 110 

Sonia: percent on the daytime. I'm an elementary teacher who I wore. Very modest clothing and not that I've always I felt like that. I needed to be not unmodest. I guess is the word, but I wear very modest clothing. There wasn't a whole lot of [00:09:00] room for expression, even though I am an elementary teacher.

I was an elementary teacher. So that. Changed, but to go back to you, sorry, I got to go back to the my space. I had those pictures posted. I get a my space message that says we have we're working on creating this dance troupe. We'd be really interested in meeting you. If you're interested. We're having a meeting at this place.

We really love to talk. And I was like. Delete who is this creepy person slipping into your DMs, some creepy person. And I, so I didn't say anything. I was just like, okay, crazy, whatever. And I didn't even look at who sent it. I just thought it was some sort of whatever, because I was plus size that I'm plus size.

Um, they're talking about dancer and performance. And I have a theater background. I did theater in high school and a little in college, but I. Was like, I'm in my 30s. Of course, I'm thinking I'm way too old [00:10:00] for this. So I just deleted it. And then I got another message in the Molly is the person who messaged me and she said, I realized that original message may have seemed creepy.

But here is what we're doing. Feel free to check us out. Whatever. And something you said, why not? I had talked to Josh, my roommate about doing community theater. Quite a bit before, because I was really I was missing theater. I was missing performance beyond teaching. So I messaged her and she said, we're having a meeting this time, this date, this place, and I showed up and it just started from there.

And I know 

Jacqui: 1 of the skill sets that you had that you brought. Is your singing, if you've got a theater background, plus you can sing, I can absolutely see why they would want you when you're doing a variety show. 

Sonia: What's so funny is my first year, they didn't know I could sing. Really? I, honestly, I've never had confidence in my [00:11:00] singing voice, so I didn't.

I didn't show that I could sing. I'd have to duet with somebody else to sing it first. But, I have, from what they say, I have a very, very good presentation voice. I'm good at, because of the teacher in me, I'm good at wrangling. So I was a good host. I can speak off the fly. I can make little jokes. I can impromptu.

And they were, they enjoyed that part of that. I also have a wicked sense of humor. 

Jacqui: And teachers have an incredible ability to speak to the back of the room. I don't quite have as perfect teacher voice as I used to, but holy crap, when I need to project, look out. 

Sonia: Yes, I. And my junior year of high school went to the new kids on the block concert, sold out Bush stadium and screamed, I love you, Donnie.

And he said, thank you. He heard my big mouth over everybody. So Jenny McCarthy, he [00:12:00] loved me first. Now you are.

Jacqui: Part of this troop. What was your process? To get ready for the show, did you have a persona that you 

Sonia: used when we were first establishing personas and what we would be, what we're comfortable performing? That was 1 of the things I really loved about the 2 girls or the 2 gals who were the organizers was the fact that they were very mindful of comfort level.

That was my big, that was my big concern because I was like, [00:13:00] I'm a teacher and I spoke to my administrator before I did this to say, look, this is what I'm thinking about doing. And she was very open minded. And she said, as long what you do on your time isn't our business, but it can't be promoted at school.

It can't be promoted with it. It was being smart about keeping the 2 things separate. And no 1 knew that I was doing it unless they were a personal friend of mine. They didn't know, and I lived an hour away from where I worked. So there was a separation too, but they were very mindful of that. So we sat down and talked about what we'd be comfortable doing.

And I was like, I don't have a dance background at all. I don't get me wrong. If a bop comes on, I can dance, but I. And I'm not a big dancer, and I said, I think that comedy would probably be where my strong point would be. I do have theater, so I can, you know, embrace a character. Or if you can look at me and say, I want a, this type of [00:14:00] person, I can probably pull that out of a hat somewhere.

You can do some voices. We just brainstormed things. And I came up with the stage name, Trixie Trojan, because Trixie is, I was a speed racer. And I used to drive. I'm a fast driver and I grew up in a race car family. So Trixie was the, when I was a kid on my little, my dad's side of the family would, that would be little Trixie.

They're also redheaded. And then Trojan was my high school mascot. And so I was like, I put the 2 together and I thought, I love this name and Trojans. Of course, people think condoms too, but whatever. And so I thought. This would be this great name, and then anytime that I would perform, I was in what we call full force drag because I always wore wigs.

I always moved my eyebrows. Or I did full drag [00:15:00] makeup, so I would either move my eyebrows or I'd have false eyelashes. I would do redo my cheekbones. I would do all these different things, illusions with makeup. I was always the vixen, the va va voom type of gal. That was my persona, but I was also a host too.

So I would look sassy and sensuous, but I would, you know, say really inappropriate things. And 

Jacqui: Can we get a little Trixie right now? Do you, can you get in touch with Trixie or is 

Sonia: she long gone? She might be, girl, she's in the retirement home. Okay. Trixie would say things like, Oh, hello everybody. My name is Trixie Trojan.

I put the TTNA or something like that. And a lot of it was, was audience reactions. So if you had a more chilly crowd, you would. Pick people out of the crowd and be like, oh, honey, what's going on here? I don't know. I was, I felt like a cross [00:16:00] sometimes between Karen Walker from Will and Grace with the kind of snarky, whatever, to more of a, just a silly kind of.

Did you have a special voice? No, I just use my, okay. Yeah, I just use my own speaking voice. Of course, depending on who you're talking to and what you're doing, your timbre changes. Right. But yes, our very first performance, we, we practiced. Three nights a week, it was not a paid gig. It was a volunteer gig and you would pay for your costumes and things like this.

So it truly was like a community type sort of thing. And once we met and people were chosen to be on the troop, the name of the troop was the bombshell buddies of St. Louis. We, once that all got started, the co creator. Was a choreographer, so we worked with her 3 nights a week doing different sets. We had 3 group [00:17:00] sets and each performance and then each person would have a solo or a duet.

So we, by the time we would have 12 to 15 different performances with a little bit of chat on the. For between breaks or whatnot. So our very first performance, you were asking about what kind of things that we did. We had, we had a balloon ballet where we danced to Blue Danube with blue balloons, all attached to us and we had pins in our hands.

So on the doo doo, the bum, we popped the balloon. So by the time we were finished, we didn't have any balloons on. And we went from that kind of classical, like ballet type whatnot, and I didn't realize that I could learn dance and I did. So it was a nice little self esteem sort of thing for me, especially as a plus size person.

And I probably talk about that a lot. I loved burlesque. I love watching burlesque. I love watching performance yet. I never saw anybody who looked [00:18:00] like me. And I wanted somebody who looked like me, so I thought, if you can't find it, do it. And that was one of the biggest reasons that I did it. And I'm so glad that I did.

But the first performance, we'd had that. And then we had Talking in Your Sleep, the 80s song. And we were all in pajamas with pigtails and little cutesy whatevers. And we had pillow fights. And, Teddy bears, and there was clothes that come off. I had things that were in layers. You would, but it was all more about how you slid your shoulders or how you held your eyes or whatever, more than just the fact that you're going to see your hoo ha and your wahoo.

You know what I mean? I can't imagine 

Jacqui: you, you revealing too much, but maybe 

Sonia: I'd be surprised. I really, for, I was more modest, honestly. I do have. My bosoms, okay, we'll say, cause I'm an 80 year old woman, apparently. No, I had cleavage, but honestly, I was one of the, probably the more modest dancers [00:19:00] as far as like seeing things like seeing like nudity or whatever.

Now, mouth wise, no, no, I was not modest in that. As you guys 

Jacqui: got going, what were some other, just in general, what were the shows? Like, where did you guys 

Sonia: perform? We, it was an over 21 performance. So you had to be carded to get into the performance. It was just an artistic mishmash of a celebration of different types of women in diversity.

We performed at local bars. We actually performed at Webster university a few times. Um, But you had to be 21 to get in. You had to be carded because of the, just the language and what we were doing. We did shows and performance like dance routines, and then it went from dance routines to, we did some comedy skits where people would talk about things, stand up.

Comedian, we had an impromptu comedian come and [00:20:00] do that was the host for a while. And then I did some hosting as well. That was just comedic and getting the crowd started in the wrangling. And then we decided on Tuesday nights that we were going to do something called booby bingo. And at a local bar called lemons in St.

Louis, it's now closed, but not because of us, but it's it closed after we, we were just established, but, uh, you would come in, go to basically, you would go to the bar with your friends and play bingo, except we would do a little kind of stripper Ella type TZ. Whatever things between bingo games, our Halloween show, all of the, all the girls were wearing some sort of Halloween costume and some of them were real sexy and campy.

And some of them were real gory and gross. And we had a mummy that was actually, she was down to just. Black tape as far as covering things, but she was completely wrapped in gauze and whatever. And she was running, I think, of course, it's all falling off, but it was part of the game. And we had a [00:21:00] girl come out of a coffin and dance to Rob Zombie's Living Dead Girl.

And so you have like the little shows in between, but we would have the bingo games too. So it would be like, be nine, my tumor is B9, do things like that. Oh, 69. Oh, 69 things. That sort of thing. So I, I did was the caller. I did the hosting and then we did, that was my baby bingo was the first time I sang and just sing a very little bit and then got to where I was getting the courage to sing more, I was.

I was way after before I would even do karaoke and I sang on stage when I was in high school and middle school, but I don't know, I never really had a whole big confidence in that, but then that started singing and then some of it came into, Oh, let's take these Christmas carols, like favorite things and make it real dirty when let's do Mary Poppins and pull things out of Mary Poppins bag, but they'd be really inappropriate adult [00:22:00] toys and, and singing a spoonful of sugar in your most sweet, okay.

Melodic Mary Poppins voice, that sort of thing. What? 

Jacqui: Are some of your favorite stories, memories of that time, 

Sonia: I have a few, some, a lot of those that some of the performance we did, because it was, we were so blessed that the creators were so witty, they were witty, smart, funny. Women who would love to do things that were just a little bit out of the box to make you go along came Jones.

We did that whole camp with a long came Jones with the villain that tied the girl on the railroad track comes in. I was the villain. So I had the mustache and I would tie her up and then Jones would come on his horse and then Jones and I ran off into the sunset. So, you know, that sort of thing that a lot of that sort of performance and the feelings that I got from that, because it really gave [00:23:00] me a lot of courage and self confidence and things and the reaction of the audience.

Was the other thing, because I would have so many people come up to me, small women, especially come up to me and say, Oh my gosh, it is so nice to see a performer who looks like me, or I love watching it makes me feel good about myself. And that for me is probably my biggest and most heartfelt memory.

I do have some funny ones. And of course, that's what people wanna hear is the funny things that happen. , they don't wanna hear the smush and the smalls about it. They wanna hear the, they like the SMTs, but you Yeah. But they wanna hear when Absolutely. The funny stuffs. Yeah. The first one we had, we were performing at lemons.

It [00:24:00] was a Wednesday or Thursday night, so it was a. It wasn't even like a weeknight, so it wasn't very super crowded, but there was a group of businessmen there who were entertaining out of town businessmen. And I did a performance. I think it was actually, it was Boobie Bean, but I was hosting. I was taking a break.

Somebody was performing. And one of the gentlemen asked me, came up to me because I was dressed as the queen of hearts and I had a riding crop. And as one would, because we did a skit with Alice and Queen of Hearts doing playing cards playing strip poker and play playing with the Queen of Hearts by Juice Newton.

And so we played, we did that and he said, okay, I have a weird request. And I was like, Oh Lord. And he said, we have this, we're entertaining these people, blah, blah, blah, blah. And he's one of my associates who is a Japanese, but he was from Japan. He's really is enamored by you and he's, is there any way that you would pull him on stage and spank him with the [00:25:00] riding crop?

And I'm like,

sure, I'll do this because what you do, you play the audience, I'm not doing anything that's illegal or anything like that. So I pulled him on the stage and I was. Like could, I don't remember his name, could you come here? And I went and got him and I pulled him on stage. I was like, Oh honey, how are you?

I've heard you've been really bad. Is that true? And he's just grinning and having the rest of the time. And I said, Oh, this is what bad boys get. And I had him stand up and put his hands on. I whacked his backside with that rotting crop three or four times. And he was just having a blast and I didn't hold back and I got an arm on you.

So. I left his bottom a few times and he's just, he was laughing. They were dying. They were having the, when a crowd is having the absolute best, right. They were having absolutely the best time. So we had like tip jars and stuff like that, and they could put tips in. Whatever. And we were getting tips really high and [00:26:00] we always use those tips when that's what we use for costuming and sets and stuff.

So he's just laughing. He's loving it. I finally stopped. I take him, take him back to his seat and I had red lipstick on. So I kissed his forehead. So he's got a great big lipstick print right here and go backstage to change into my hosting, whatever. And the guy found me and he was like, here, you take this.

And he gave me 300. It's like the fastest 300 I've ever made in my life. And there's a poor teacher. You could use that money as a poor teacher and 300 then was like 500 now. So it definitely, and I, I split it with the group. They insisted that I kept half of it because it was my, my idea and I, I played it up big.

I could have just brought him upstate or whatever, but I, I'm. Made a big deal of it. And the guy was like, Oh my God, he can't wait to come back. Are you guys here every Wednesday? Because we're ready. He wants to be here. And so [00:27:00] we're not here every Wednesday, but keep a, keep an eye for us. And this is our website and whatnot, but I'm pretty 

Jacqui: sure he did not go home and tell his family about that adventure.

Sonia: He may have.

I don't know. So that's definitely, that was definitely a fun adventure. Yeah. It was a good time. I did accidentally flash a police officer one time though, too. Yeah. This is not my best moment, but I have not heard this one. Okay. Lay it on me. I was going home from performance and I lived the bar that I was performing at was less than.

That's probably a half a mile from my house. It was winter. So I had this big, long black Fox for a coat. And I thought, I'm just going to throw that on. And you walked home and I didn't walk home. Okay. I was getting, I had my stuff. You have your [00:28:00] bag and all of that. And I threw everything in my trunk. And stuck it in the back of my, I had an SUV at the time, so I just stuck it back in the SUV, got in the truck, and I have my big black coat, big fox fur moment going on.

I still have my wig on. I'm in full makeup. That's what I wanted to know. 

Jacqui: Okay, so Trixie 

Sonia: is out and now has this big fur on as well. I'll paint the picture. I'm in a pink and white. Dolly Parton wig, okay down like huge curls. I'm in full face makeup, like lashes and everything. I'm wearing a corset, black corset with pink in it, thigh highs, fishnets.

And high heel boots, probably street walker esque, but with class, okay, because I did classy things. And so I, I did not want to change clothes there because the dressing room is always uber [00:29:00] crowded. I'm less than a half a mile from home. It's a school night. It's a Tuesday night. And I'm like, I just want to get home.

I'll change at home, take a quick shower, go to bed. Cause I always had to take a shower after performance because you're sweating gross and whatever. So I have my coat on. I pull out of the bar and I get flat, I get the cherries, so I pull over and this very looks like a linebacker, like refrigerator linebacker, huge African American bald police officer says, hello, man, can I see your license and registration?

And I'm going, Oh, okay. And I said, I said, sir, I just left lemons. And I think that they used to do like a check there to make sure that people weren't drinking and driving, to be honest. So I said, I'm really sorry, but my stuff is in the back. That's my drive. My everything is in the back. I just threw it back there.

Is it okay if I get out? And he said, sure. So me not thinking, I opened the car door and a gust of [00:30:00] wind comes in as I Kind of slide out because I'm up high cause I'm in an SUV. My coat flies open in this, you could not orchestrate it any more beautifully. And every single bit that I have out there to show his eyes saw it because his eyes went from being normal size to like dinner plates.

And I had, I didn't know what to do for a moment. Like you freeze. It's like you had that life moment where you just freeze and you're like. I just flashed a police officer. I'm going to jail. I can see it now. Third grade teacher thrown in jail for indecent exposure. So I'm like Elliot Davis, who is a local investigative reporter is going to come to school.

I'm having these moments. So I grabbed my coat and I pulled it and I was like, Oh my gosh, I am so sorry. I'm a performer at. at Lemons. We just finished a set. I live right there. I can see my house. I said, I am so sorry. And he was like, he's standing there. And the [00:31:00] guy, his, the guy who's driving the car, cause they go in pairs, he's driving the cars.

He's not sorry. He's not going to be able to walk back to the car. And so I'm like mortified. And I said, would you still would you like me to get he's no, ma'am. He's you just made my night. Thank you. You drive safe. You got a tail light out, get that fixed. And so he walks back to his car and the guy I can hear him.

We're going to this is going to be the talk of the station for 2 weeks. And I can hear the guy like. Yelling or whatever. So I get in my car and the driver pulls up next to me so I can talk to him more. And he says, so he's like, when do you guys perform every and I told him, I was like, you guys should come by.

It's fun. He's you just made my buddy's night. He's he's so quiet. He's not going to say anything, but you just made his night, whatever. So It was funny because after that, the police officer who was driving came to a few of our shows. Now, the guy I [00:32:00] flashed did not come. He was like, he is a homebody. He's quiet.

He's really introverted. He is not, this is not my scene. But I was like, you were the talk of the, like, you made his whole year. I didn't get arrest for flashing a police officer, but I got a heck of a good story. So, but it got you out of a ticket. Yeah. It got me out of a ticket. I was telling a friend of mine afterwards, I was like, maybe I should do that all the time.

Well, it 

Jacqui: tells you how good your gales are. They 

Sonia: got you out of a ticket. 

They got me out of a ticket. They got. I don't know if it was the gals or the legs, one of the two, but something did the look on his face. How would you have certain memories just emblazed right in his eyes were as big as dinner plates.

I don't think that's what he was expecting. Even though I'm in this big Dolly Parton wig and I've got the fur. Around, I don't think he was expecting me to get out of the car and it just go whoosh and show all the bits. Oh, you had a Maryland [00:33:00] moment. I totally had a Maryland moment and it was so funny and telling my girls that it was like, it was a good time.

Thank goodness. It was funny. I performed before everybody had smartphones and took videos and everything. You know what I mean? Yeah, thank goodness. I don't know if I would have been able to do that if that would have been the. No, as 

Jacqui: a teacher, there 

Sonia: was no way. There was, there would be no way. But yes, I was a elementary teacher by day and a burlesque dancer by night.

Isn't there 

Jacqui: a, like a movie or something like that just feels like a movie 

Sonia: story. I, I would think so. It's funny. Cause when you say burlesque dancer, there is like so many visions that come in people's head. It really was to me, it was innocent. It was just adult adults, having adult fun, not, it wasn't anything that was hurting anybody.

It wasn't, it just, it's fun. We did a lot of laughing. We included audiences and things that were just fun. And as we progressed and got. I got in the weeds as [00:34:00] performers. We started bringing in drag performers. So we brought in the LGBTQ community as well. And I did a duet with a local drag queen a few times who was a good friend of mine.

We did some performing together too. We did Christmas shows. We did Halloween shows. We did a few shows in the summer. We got to where. A lot, we would basically, if you would pay for a set or we had a place to go, we would perform there. How 

Jacqui: long did you do the burlesque? 

Sonia: I did it for About I think about 2 years, if you add from beginning to end, it was 6 to 2008 is about as long as I did it.

And for me, it gave me a performance outlet. I was craving doing some sort of performing or stage work and it gave me that it gave me an opportunity to see and meet. A lot of different in like diverse, different people, different kinds of people. But about [00:35:00] 2008, I got to where it was starting to get expensive.

It was branching off a little bit. The creators were going in different ways to. like with each other, but also just with the performance and stuff. And it got to where it was. I was having less and less time to be able to go to performances and things because of the pressures and the expectations of school.

I took on another job. So I just got to where I didn't have. As much time. So I stepped back, but it was a fun, it was a fun gig for when it was we did photo shoots, like things I never thought I would ever do. If you would have told fat kid, Sonia, that you're going to be a burlesque dancer and you're going to have photo shoots and you're going to wear glamorous clothes and people are going to consider you whatever hot.

I don't know. It's not my definition, but do you know what I mean? I would have told you, you were crazy. I'm from a small town who. I've never ever felt like I was an attractive person. You know what I mean? And to do that and to [00:36:00] feel that, but also to give that to other people who felt like I did, that was the trade for me.

And I made some great memories and some really great friends, people that I enjoyed spending time wonderful.

Jacqui: This, Oh, this has been a really fun 

Sonia: conversation. The look on people's faces when I've told them I've done burlesque, I think they either think that I'm, they like, because usually I get looked up and down, but it's, I think either they think I'm nuts, which might be a fair assessment, 

Jacqui: then they don't know you because you told me that you had done burlesque.

I'm like, that makes absolute perfect sense. That it [00:37:00] did not surprise me in the slightest you're you have a burlesque 

Sonia: personality. I've been told that I've been told that you have a Dolly 

Jacqui: Parton's wig personality. I, the only thing that like, surprises me is that you don't wear it more often. She's 

Sonia: a part of my past.

Do you know what I'm saying? I don't know if I would enjoy it like I did then and I don't know if it was because I did it so much because it's it is exhausting to do. I would spend almost 2 hour and a half, 2 hours and makeup and hair before performance. And getting all that together, it's also really expensive hair and all of that is not cheap, but you spend all of that time getting ready for performances.

And it really helped me realize that, yes, I, even though I enjoyed it, it definitely needed to be more of a hobby [00:38:00] than a job for me, because it's a lot. It really is. Though I 

Jacqui: feel like teaching it, like I always would say when I was done with the day teaching, I just did five shows today. I'm exhausted.

Sonia: Yeah, that was the other thing. It was like, I'm a teacher and I, because you do, you perform the entire time you're there. So you're exhausted. Oh, absolutely. I just don't, I don't feel the need for that extreme anymore. If left to our 

Jacqui: own devices. We would talk all day. Yes, we 

Sonia: would. We're gonna have 

Jacqui: to wrap it up.

Sonja, thank you so much for coming on my show and sharing all of these fantastic 

Sonia: stories and informational tidbits about burlesque. Yeah, it absolutely my pleasure as we could talk for hours and I could devil into a lot of our performance, but I feel like I hit the cliff notes version of it and that's absolutely [00:39:00] okay.

This was a pleasure and what's so nice to shout out to the bombshell buddies of St. Louis and any of the performers who may be listening to this or performed with me. They really did touch me in a big way. And I'm so thankful. I feel very blessed to have been a part of it. Even though it was just for a short time.

What a 

Jacqui: fun, intelligent, and giving person is Sonya. I seriously adore this woman. I'm glad you got a chance to hear her story. Thank you, Sonya, for sharing it. And thank you listeners for sticking around. 2024 is just around the corner. Can you believe it? That means I am planning out episodes for next year already.

Do you have a great idea for an episode? Do you or somebody you know have an amazing story to share or is there a concept or topic you would really enjoy hearing about? I want to hear your thoughts. The best way to do this is to go to my website, JackieLentz. com. I will have the link in the episode notes.[00:40:00] 

And leave me a note using the contact link or 

Sonia: drop a line in the comment 

Jacqui: section beneath this episode. I hope you are making time for yourself 

Sonia: this holiday season. It is the perfect 

Jacqui: gift to give yourself. Until next time, I wish you well.