WENDY LESTINA is a newspaper columnist ("From The Back Pew," The Ferndale Enterprise); former editor-in-chief of Savvy magazine (NYC) and Small Press magazine (NY); and is the author of two books of humor. She has had non-fiction essays published in The New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Oregonian, and many women's magazines. Wendy holds an honorary Doctor of Letters from Middlebury College. Until recently she wrote as "Wendy Reid Crisp." Now she uses her married name.

                              42.7% of all statistics are made up on the spot


Yale did a survey in the mid-eighties, about the same time that 64.3 percent of working women finally screwed up the courage to ask for a living wage, and the survey claimed that a single woman over thirty had a greater chance of being killed by a terrorist than she did of getting married.

This statistic terrified 82.1 percent of the S.W. O. T., who at the time represented 31.4 percent of all women in the country, and don’t even ask about black women, 62.4 percent of which were S.W. O.T., and their chances of killed by a terrorist instead of getting married were 1:1.78 billion, a really big number, and you can imagine how much bigger it would be in kilometers, or whatever it is that 45.2 percent of the people in Europe measure themselves with, although I’ve been told that only 3.2 percent of the people in Europe are black.  I’m not particularly skilled at math, which is why this idea of making up statistics is an excellent solution to enable someone like me to compete in the scientific marketplace where 89 percent of the good jobs are.

So here’s my friend Harriett, and she’s black, excuse me, only 13 percent of blacks want to be called that nowadays, she’s African-American, she’s over thirty, and she’s not married, although she’s been sleeping with two guys about 2.4 times a week, which means she’s getting laid 37 percent of the time, if you count sleeping with someone while you're having sex as waking hours. Harriett is also educated, and the Yale survey said that an education reduces the chances of getting married by an additional 15 percent for all women and 90.8 percent for black women.

“Child, I don’t believe in statistics,” Harriett said.. “Lies, damned lies, and statistics. That’s what they say, and, honey, they’re right. And you’re talking to someone who got an A in stat from SUNY Binghamton, that’s right, an A in stat from SUNY, you know what I’m saying? That’s right.”

Harriett, beautiful high butt, a trait of 46 percent of African-American women; long legs, 23 percent; long eyelashes, 17.1 percent; cute little tits, 11 percent, and she has two fine men (5.2 percent) taking turns with her in a drop-dead loft ( 1.4 percent) in Tribeca (.0003 percent) - Harriett takes her fancy ass, pulls 64.8 percent of the affirmative action levers and gets a job (89.1 percent) as a bond trader (.0002 percent) on the 102nd floor (.0000000033 percent)  of the World Trade Center (.0000000000000000000000000000001 percent). Which is why I’m applying to Yale and hope sincerely that you will consider this essay worthy of your attention and if so, if you will send financial aid information in the enclosed self-addressed, stamped envelope, and also some statistics on your enrollment of single men between the ages of 35 and death who will marry someone immediately to help thwart the evil empire.

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© 2002 Wendy Lestina