Excerpts in JAVA Magazine
March, 2010
The business and personal promotion phenomenon that is Dr. Dot whirled in and out of the Valley briefly a couple of weeks ago. The self-described Massage Therapist, Sex Columnist, Author, Singer and Celebrity Confidant came to town to drum up massage business at an annual convention for the performance tour industry. Marginally successful there, she truly excelled in her main area of expertise - BEING Dr. Dot!
The JAVA offices made the connection for me. She had come in yesterday and was leaving tomorrow. "Tonight," I was told, "she plays." If I was going to behold the good doctor (an admittedly un-official title) this would be my only opportunity. 10:30pm. Uncle Monkey's in Mesa. I'm in.
Search your heart out on the net - there's plenty to see and most of it is supplied by her. The basics are thus: Hippie parents taught her massage. Became a teenage concert junkie. Supported her habit by trading massage favors for access to gigs. Went from massaging for access to massaging for pay thanks to Charlie Watts of the Rolling Stones. Toured with the Dead for a year with a German boy who "looked like John Lennon." Had a baby with him. Dated Bruce Willis. Has apartments in Berlin and the New York City area. Featured multiple times on German TV. Can drop names like most people drop skin cells.
In recent years, she's developed a worldwide army of "Dot Bots" - licensed massage therapists and/or chiropractors who get their assignments directly through Dr. Dot. They earn a spot on the team by either auditioning in person or, more typically, for someone else who has, and who knows what Dr. Dot requires.
In addition to that, she writes contributions for Penthouse, a regular sex and relationship advice column for the NYC alternative rag, the New York Press, and something similar for a German sex publication. "I'm really mean in that one. Oh God, am I MEAN!"
Right at 10:30 I enter Uncle Monkey's, a hopping and unpretentious joint in a strip mall near Southern and Dobson in Mesa. Looks like a dive, smells like a dive, but the place is packed with regulars, drinks are cheep and the girl behind the bar is cute as Hell (cuter, really.) At the far end of the room, past the dancing couples and the young guys playing pool, in front of the DJ booth, at a cocktail table with an entourage of two, stands the figure of Dr. Dot. She looks for all the world as if she could be Christina Applegate's busty younger sister.
She's doing karaoke.
More to the point, she has come to kick some karaoke ASS. "Did you see me do Stevie Wonder?!" she asks.
"No - I didn't even know he was here!" She doesn't get it. "What did you sing?"
"I did 'Livin For The City.'"
"Great song! How did you do?" I ask.
"It was phenomenal."
I'm expecting her to smile, but it's immediately clear that she is merely stating a fact. No irony at all, and she doesn't stay engaged for my reaction. She's busy looking through the catalog, trying to decide on her next phenomenal performance. "Nobody even clapped. Everybody here is so apathetic."
Hmm.
Not wanting to interrupt her search, I introduce myself to one of her two companions, a pretty young lady in jeans named Rachel who, though attentive, seems very tired. I tell her the conversation I'd just had. She chuckles knowingly at my description of Dr. Dot's glowing self praise and then acknowledges, "well she WAS pretty damn good."
And so she would continue to be. Over the next couple of hours and at two different bars, she does a handful of other songs and owns each and every one. Her takeover of Tina Turner's part in "Proud Mary" was a revelation. Sure, Ike was still helping out on the low end, but Dr. Dot was neither derivative nor inferior. It helped that she had the short skirt and pumps, but the vocal alone would have still passed the audition.
As it turns out, Rachel and the other girl in the entourage are Dot Bots, and joined up in Mesa to man a booth at the convention. Rachel is local, Dr. Dot flew in from New York City ("O.K., well Hoboken"), and the other girl is from Michigan.
There's no phony pretense that this is a party of equals, and no reason there should be any. They all have an easy rapport with one another, but there's no disputing who is in charge. The alpha is not prepared to concede any ground and the betas don't try.
If she's king of the hill, though, she's a benevolent one. Both in person and online, an unavoidable aspect of her personality is that she gives credit where it's due. She is fiercely proud of the Dot Bots and credits their talent with the success of the concept. Instead of saying good things happen to her because she's innately deserving, she comfortably and naturally acknowledges others for giving her the various opportunities that have come her way.
She also has, when she wants to exhibit it, something that customer service experts call "relationship extension." She can approach strangers and develop a mutually rewarding, temporary, relationship with them. This skill was on display throughout the night whenever something would catch her attention or pique her curiosity. Not only with men (who are more apt to allow her in anyway) but also with other women; such as servers, karaoke dj's, and various strangers in the clubs. If she wants to know something, she asks. She made them feel that she was genuinely interested in them, and she seemed to be.
At Uncle Monkey's, she leeds a one-table rebellion to change the mood of the room. We clap for every karaoke performer, good and not so much, because it's only right. Dot's not looking for anything she's not prepared to reciprocate.
Dr. Dot says she only drinks alcohol occasionally, and tonight she has cranberry juice at one bar and club soda at the next. That is one thing that separated her from most every other patron. She doesn't smoke - neither cigarettes nor marijuana ("It makes you apathetic!")
The doctor works her message - it's her primary asset these days - and that message is "I've been included in the lives of celebrities." It's not mere words. At least three different times between the two clubs and at breakfast afterward, she took out either her phone or camera and riffled through scads of candid photos of her with artists of varying renown. There are far too many to mention, but try these on for size: Mick Jagger, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Sting, Joey Ramone, Motorhead, Tool, Depeche Mode… They kept coming, long after the point had been made.
Which is cool in a way and a shame, as well. Dot Stein (her real name) is talented and energetic in her own right. She's built - and is still building - a small empire in a niche market. She's smart enough not to let her indulgences drag her down, yet independent enough to carve her own path. She is every bit as rock and roll as the "stars" she massages and banks on. When pressed, she concedes that the celebrity angle is a means to an end - it opens doors. One must wonder, though, if she will always be comfortable being so strongly identified in terms of the company she keeps rather than her own achievements.
The entire Dr. Dot International Massage operation is, apparently, done from her cell phone; with ALL the calls worldwide going to Dr. Dot personally before being assigned out. She maintains absolute control over everything. Obviously this saves her money, and satisfies the control freak in her, but how much larger can it all get before she goes nuts? She just shrugs.
While virtually everyone else around us was getting loose and letting it all hang out, she kept her cool, kept her edge and kept control. She observed everything and everyone. If this was an example of blowing off steam, I felt a little sorry for her, actually. There was never a ten minute period where she wasn't checking her cell phone for new messages and massage requests. If there's a time when she's not on, it wasn't this night.
After the bars, we headed to Denny's for breakfast, where Dot let her guard down a bit. She's a natural observer and formulates opinions on many things. "Are you circumcised?" Uh… "American guys are usually circumcised. They're also limp. I've known some boys in Ireland and their dicks were hard as diamonds over there! It's because they put fluoride in the water here - it gives guys limp dicks and makes them apathetic." Yes, sir, opinions.
By 3:30am, fatigue was taking its toll. The girl from Michigan had long since left, and Rachel was about to pass out. I had begun my day intending to end it at least five hours earlier. Tomorrow, Dr. Dot had another busy day ahead, with an early afternoon flight back to New York and some potentially contentious negotiations with a band manager who wasn't towing the line; yet only she seemed unfazed by the late hour. Finally, though, she took pity on us and called it a night. Sort of.
"If you want to talk more you can come back to the hotel," she said, "but I'm not going to fuck you. I'm also not going to give you a blow job." In true rock and roll fashion, Dr. Dot knows how to get her point across.
Some other times a comment like this, though coming from left field, may have offended me. Maybe I would have protested about how much I've avoided drinking fluoridated water all these years. I mean, a guy likes to be asked, you know?
In the end, though, I just smiled and said, "That's o.k." The evening, and not marijuana or fluoride, had rendered me apathetic.
POSTSCRIPT
I've heard from Dr. Dot since this piece (or most of it) came out in the print version of Java. She was at first very complimentary, and ultimately very bitter. In the space of three days (March 5 - 8) she friended me and UN-friended me on Facebook. She claims that I misquoted her. I don't believe so. One error that I DID make was in describing the nature of the publication she writes for in Germany. What I called a "sex publication" is actually an arts/entertainment magazine that Dot informs me is similar to JAVA, only larger. Fair enough. I stand by all the rest.
You can read her blog post about it here, and read the original excerpt printed in JAVA Magazine. The full piece is what you see above. There was one line she asked me to omit in my online posting. I did so as a courtesy, and because from my standpoint the change was insignificant. It's neither the first, nor the last, instance of me eating a little shit to keep the peace. It's usually more effective.
I certainly can't fault her for wishing to guard the value of her "brand." The piece I did is the only thing I can find online that is anything but a re-statement of her own advertising message. If that's what all this is, though, then I think she's being much too sensitive. I said some pretty nice things about her, after all. She tells me that in her public railings against me she intentionally omitted my last name so I wouldn't have to "worry about anybody looking [me] up." How kind. She did, however, reprint the entire article; so I presume that she feels my veracity is only questionable when she doesn't like what I say. I'd like the by-line back, but no worries, Dot - my gift to you. Rock on.
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