Spring Break is a strange bird when yes, you get a break from classes but no, not a break from your many occupations. I have been a bit sour over this fact, this week. But I have tried to make the best of it.
The love birds are nesting above the giant iron gate at the coffee shop. The mama tends to drop nest particles on our customers. We’re all here!
Cafe au lait-with-a-shot-of-caramel-Lady informed us that she was being secretly filmed for “What Not to Wear” last week after she bought her beverage from us. Apparently the hosts of the show invaded her closet and threw everything in the rubbish bin whilst pleasantly mocking her. Next week they’re flying her to NYC to go on a $5k shopping spree. Yesterday they called her to ask, “How are your bras? Most women have terrible bras.”
The whole thing sounds horribly hysterical and invasive. Welcome to Los Angeles.
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After finals I finally rode my bike to Guitar Center and bought those new strings I’ve been needing for the last 8 months. Although I audibly grumbled the entire way through it, I even took off the old strings myself and dusted off the poor thing. I really hate changing strings.
To celebrate, I picked three spring-breaky songs that I enjoy and decided to learn them, note-for-note. This is quite unlike my usual learning of songs, which–to use a Jesus-y biblical metaphor–is more like the Message translation than the literal note-for-note of the King James Authorized. I usually learn the jist of a song and then call it a day. But today is a new day.
The hardest one of the three is, “Crosses,” by Jose Gonzales. I am terrible at finger-picking, but the boy is making me learn. I’ll be middle-aged by the time I can manage to sing the thing in time, but hey. One thing at time, girl.
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Lately on my bike ride to work, I’ve noticed how I have a very particular relationship with all of the school-crossing guards. For some, we have a waving-relationship. To another, we have a knowing-nod relationship. But my favorite of all is the grandma who walks her chihuahua every morning in her amazing pink bathrobe. The lady is loving life. She smiles so brightly and waves at me like I’m her long-lost grandchild, as I come careening down the hill.
I would like to give all of these beautiful drive-by morning people a name and start writing stories about them.
I like these characters, your descriptions. I will read these stories when they are written.
Another one good with character descriptions–Flannery O’Connor:
“In the backseat of the car, the grandmother folded her prim hands and pointed out interesting artifacts and features in the landscape to her bored grandchildren, who didn’t even pretend to look.”
Ha! I just feel like that tells us more in a sentence than a whole same-old paragraph could.
Here we all are! We’re all here!
i look forward to your morning-people-stories. 🙂
confession: I shamelessly watch “What Not to Wear” on my lunch break more often than I should. And yes, it is horribly histerical and invasive, but I sure do like the shoes that Stacy London picks out!
seriously… i need to quit. 🙂
are we getting some where?
or did you get lost in amsterdam?
are we getting some where?
or did you get lost in amsterdam?