hot coffee girl

Main Characters: Hot Coffee Girl, Shasmecka-the-Flying-Dog.

Supporting Cast: Cujo,  Jean-the-Lawyer, Bar Patrons

Scene: Quiet Monday night in Tremont, about 9:15 p.m.

Curtain rises to HCG, sitting in her apartment. Goes to light a smoke. Realizes that she will need a fresh pack before the morning.  Grabs money out of her purse, and looks at the dog. Puts on harness, sweater, attaches leash. Scoops her up and they head out.

Sets dog down outside the door. Locks the door, puts keys in pocket. Proceeds to walk down street.

(Seconds later...)

Large dog charges out of Edison's Pub. Fangs, fur, barking. Cujo-looking motherfucker. At least to HCG.

HCG screams like a girl at the top of her lungs, yanks Shasmecka up by her leash. Dog flies in the air, fully 5 feet, twirls in the air for a second, swings back around (still airborne) and lands in HCG's arms. Meantime, said bar empties of patrons. Cujo continues to bark and leap at Shasmecka and HCG.

Jean-the-Lawyer steps in and calls, "Sally!" (fucking Cujo's name is SALLY?) "Sally! Get back here." Sally reluctantly relents. HCG shakily opens door, fumbling with keys, and escapes inside vestibule. Takes off dog's sweater and leash. Sits there trembling (HCG, not Shasmecka). When heartbeat calms to less dangerous rate, HCG can hear the crowd outside, still telling the story. Slowly gets up after inspecting the small dog, assesses no permanent damage, and sends her up the stairs.

HCG leaves apartment again, sees that the crowd of people are still milling, Cujoe in tow. Still shaking, but hesitant to be known as the crazy lady who twirls her dog while screaming at the top of her lungs, she joins the onlookers.  Decides a beer would be good, and joins the crowd inside. Quickly downs a Guinness, smokes two cigarettes in a row, and departs on her original mission.

Curtain falls as she walks down toward Professor Market. 

(Who says you need to wait for an Art Walk? Street theater happens 'round the clock in the 'Mont.) 

"Umm...why do you do it if you are so bad at it?"

I replied, "Because I got bored with doing stuff I'm good at."

Aside from photography, I am a terrible visual artist. I can't draw, paint, or sculpt. At all. This, I get from my father, as my mother and brother are both excellent draw-ers. Me? Not so much. My gift of visual art has been limited to being able to (mostly) stay in the lines when handed a coloring book and some crayolas. And I can print quite neatly when there are lines on the paper already. That's about it.

So, when skulking around Michael's or JoAnn's, as I am sometime want to do, I thought it would be a bright idea to buy some paints and canvas. Oh yeah-brushes. I will need brushes, too, I thought. For less than $25 bucks (I bought cheap brushes), I had a sack full of art just waiting to happen.

I didn't get right on it...as I am also sometimes want to do. But about a week later, I stumbled across the sack 'o art, and pulled out the supplies. And I painted a couple of pictures. They were dreadful little things that no one would want to hang up on their walls. Although now SnogAsh has one in her apartment, that she paid me a beer for ... does that make me a professional painter? (Actually, when I told my dad this story, he said that I should stand on the corner in Tremont with a sign that reads "Will paint for beer". When I told him that this was actually the neighborhood where I could get pretty drunk with that idea, he agreed, and said I should probably not.)

At this point, one might imagine that I would quickly grow tired of this new hobby, as it was clear that not only was I not any good at it, but that I had little potential to get any better. This realization actually spurred me on. I am not sure what it is, but the idea that I am so bad at something, have no desire to get ANY better, and still want to do it anyhow seems okay to me. Maybe it's that it is such a departure from my personality. Generally, I throw myself into something like this so completely - read every book, need to learn everything about ... so I can be better, stronger, faster at it. There is a simple joy in the idea that I am not trying to be good; I am just enjoying the trying.

So, on this Friday afternoon, if you are getting ready to leave your workaday grind and head out into the great wide open of the weekend, I give you a challenge. Try something new that you are not/don't think you would be good at. If you are tone deaf, sing a song at the top of your lungs from start to finish. Got no rhythm? Dance so hard to a great beat that you want to fall over. Can't draw or paint? Pick up some cheap brushes and canvass. Grab your camera and pretend you are an art photographer, and take some obscure shots of the neighborhood. The only requisite is that it should not be something that you can do well, and that you don't harm yourself or others in the process. Otherwise, the sky's the limit. See how good it feels to not be great - or even good - at something, and still want to do it anyhow.

Report back to me afterwards and tell me how it went. I've got some painting to do.

I have her on my sidebar, but in case you don't visit her often enough, you have to go read about her latest endeavor here. I think this is so funny...

And tell her in the comments (there, not here) that there is a market for said item. SnogAsh already wants one, and I do, too. I would wear it every time I went to Parma. Which, Christ on a Crutch, I hope isn't often. I'd wear it other places, too.

If nothing else, it reminded me how lucky I am to have such smart, cool friends.

I think I might actually try to make a go of it.

"It" being a freelance web designer.

Because when it all shook out, I found myself as stressed as in CubicleVille and more overworked for what worked out to be roughly less than minimum wage.

So, I think ... perhaps ... it is time to start believing in myself, my abilities, and where I can truly make a living and be happy doing it.

What a scary fucking thing that is.

Eight minutes.

Eight minutes from the time we walked into the courtroom to the time the clerk was stamping the forms that said that I am no longer married.

If I had the nerve to watch the wedding video, I would hazard a guess that our vows, at sunset in Key West almost six years ago, took about the same length of time. I think our first kiss probably lasted about that, too.

I think what I feel most is an overwhelming sense of failure. I like to think that part of my job here-all of our jobs-is to leave things better than we found them. I don't feel like I did that here. While today was lacking in the drama department-we were both kind of shell-shocked at the understatedness of it all as we headed to lunch afterwards-there was considerable ugliness and sorrow that came before today.

A wise man said, just a few minutes ago, "Hurting yourself is easy; hurting a loved one takes balls and more self-loathing than a gymnasium filled with Hunter S. Thompson clones." Yes, P.T. - I have elephantitis of the nuts and hate myself more than a vegan chowing down on a filet wrapped in bacon, stuffed with veal.

I feel sad and empty in the way that you only can when you truly have let someone down. I feel like I failed not only a marriage, but another human being. I broke a promise that I swore to keep. He is a kind, good man - not the right man for me - but kind and good all the same. I am sick with the knowing that I caused him pain and most likely left this situation worse than I found it.

And probably will feel that way for longer than eight minutes.