Well, well, well. Another day; another snow squall or five.
I have a hair appointment
in Salem, New Hampshire this afternoon, so I run up there early to avoid the
highway shit-show that is sweetly referred to as “commuter traffic.” As soon as I get on the highway for this
short ride, it starts to snow, and by snow I mean nearly white-out conditions
as I cross the river overpass. Every
driver appears to be ignoring the conditions, or perhaps we have gotten so used
to this weather pattern that not a single one of us slows down. As a matter of fact, we are all doing upwards
of 75 mph as if this were just another day because the snow storms are no
longer novelty to any of us.
I pull into the parking
lot at Barnes and Noble bookstore. I go inside with the intent of working on a
writing project and buying a book. The
book isn’t anywhere in the store, but I’m reasonably certain they have it. After tracking down some help, the one copy
of the book in stock needs to be pulled from the back room. I suspect it is about to go on remainders and
that the paperback version will be out any second, thus saving me valuable
money. The thing is I don’t want to
wait. I want to read the book before I
go back from February break. I want to
read the book now.
I cough up the cash.
I intend to settle in at
the Starbucks tucked inside the store, my notebook in hand, making notes about
some changes to a manuscript that need to happen but I’ve no idea what those
changes need to be. Yes, this is my
intention until I hear the muzak the store is playing. I’m driven to near-insanity just waiting in
line to buy the book when one terrible 1970’s love song after another blares
through the store speakers. Tempted to
drop the book and run during Barbra Streisand’s “Evergreen,” I finally get
through the line, paying cash to get out quickly. I half-cover my ears as I bolt outside, terrified
that Minnie Ripperton’s voice will start squealing “Loving you is easy cuz you’re
beautiful … lalalalala… ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!”
I hightail it up the
street to a nearby Dunkin Donuts where I intend to waste an hour reading and
writing before I need to meet my daughter so we can get foiled and cut at the
salon. The line has one man waiting, but
he is ordering several coffees and buying $60 worth of $5 Dunkin gift
cards. I’m starting to wonder if I will
be able to order a cup of tea in the foreseeable future. Eventually another worker comes over, takes
my order, and I head to find a seat. Unfortunately
most of the tables in the small shop are taken up by older gentlemen. I may have walked in on the Thursday
Roundtable for the Semi-Retired. I spot
a table away from the commotion and stop to get a sugar packet.
No sugar packets.
I go back to the counter,
wait for a second time, get a sugar packet, and head for the stack of straws,
stirrers, and napkins, where they used to also keep sugar packets. I need a stirrer for the sugar, so I check
out the display, and recheck, and check again.
No stirrers.
Back to the counter I go,
and I wait … wait … wait again. Finally,
I server tells me the stirrers are “over with the straws.” Well, I must be blind, I tell her, or else I
need to put on my glasses because I just don’t see them. She leans down and grabs me a stirrer with
the same hand she used to take money from the lady next to me. Gross, but at least the tea is so hot that
any germs will be instantly burned away.
By this time, my perfect
table by the window has been stolen by three more men, a little younger than
the gray-haired dudes on the other side.
I am left with the tall table near the door or stools at the window
where there is a counter too high for me to sit at comfortably and write.
I opt for the tall table.
I decide not to read my
new book because I really need to figure out a different direction for the
manuscript that I have allowed to collect dust while I did other things, like
get my degree, get a job, get kids through school, get another degree, and
write an entire thesis on completely different topics than any of the
manuscripts I have in process. I sit in
my big-girl high-chair (yes, I am short enough that the chair is a bit of a
climb for me), take out a purple pen that I grabbed as an extra on the way out
the door earlier, and start making some notes.
I don’t think I’m getting
anywhere and debate stopping this futility when I look down and realize that I
may have solved my problem. I have
inadvertently killed off a character who wasn’t working (okay, I removed her
existence – she’s still alive in Fiction Land) and added another character, and
I’ll see how that goes during a rewrite.
I don’t know if this idle manuscript will ever be worthy of anything
other than drafts, but at least the key elements it lacked have some kind of
structured focus now. It probably still
sucks, but it doesn’t suck as badly as it did when I first walked through the
door.
My Dunks tea is still
semi-warm when the alarm sounds on my phone.
Time to pack it in and meet my daughter down the street so we can get foiled
and chopped at the salon. I’ll read my
book while she’s in the chair and contemplate those possible edits while I’m in
the chair. Unfortunately, I still have
the awful remnants of “Evergreen” stuck in my brain (the song sucks – I mean,
it really and truly sucks worse than “Song That Gets On Everybody’s Nerves”),
but, with the same luck that helped me produce several pages of literary possibilities,
perhaps I will be lucky enough to have the chemicals in my hair seep through my
skin and scalp to clear my brain of Streisand and company before the evening is
out.
Besides, with all the damn
snow on the ground and the squalls we have all afternoon, “Evergreen” is cruel
and unusual punishment just via the title.
It should be outlawed for that reason alone.
