High falutin' subject lines and titles always forebode an unfulfilling end/diatribe/paragraph/start.
In short, a draft.
at some point in describing how the area in front of the bakery cafe and the host stand as well as behind needed a sweep and mop to a new host, I christened the curve of granite "The Glorious Impediment".
I intended to go to Pier One (okay, the start already is petty - but nevertheless, a start)... to settle on a vase and decorative not-too-fake-looking floral arrangement for the hall table I had bought and built (walmart $100) so that our future returned housephone would have somewhere glamorous to rest. It should be noted, however, that I had already been to the store in the Plaza twice in the past week for the very same purpose with no result. Their inventory had doubtfully changed.
Along the way I pass the hair cutter/salon that I had on at least two occasions submitted my scalp to with hesistation. This hesistation based in the facet of complexes that deals with my inability to settle. Not settle as in give in to something, submit, relinquish care and control-- but more like relax a bit, stop shaking the bingo spinner bin thingy, the tacky desk toy with floating bubbles, allow for a restful peace to observe the okayness in something you're certain is cheating you out of something.
So this is what I did. The place had just expanded hours to be open on sunday; and the long-haired hippy-looking owner was intently concentrating on some minor construction project to put handrail-like bars around the waiting area wall for stylistic means. This was all out of sight from where I sat down in the stylist's chair, but I heard him describing in concentrated detail with mild profanity the details of his work as he went along to the two children that had accompanied my stylist, their mother, to work. I wasn't able to determine if the stylist and the owner were together or not. This was Sakinak-- something or other (I detest not remembering her name)--but the same gentle limited-english-proficiency woman that had cut my hair the past two times. Nothing too impressive, just a trim, short on the sides, long on top. Usually applying too much sticky mousse at the end and making the front spiked up like a teen from the 90s. But she gave a great massage as an added bonus while I sat in the chair each time she finished cutting. I was still undecided about the $25 cost. We engaged in smallish conversation, when I could understand her, mostly smiling and nodding. I could feel the tingling relaxed feeling I often get when in a new situation or someone is speaking or describing something and I kind of zone out without stopping listening to them, but just the sound of their voice and the good relaxed feeling. Not to mention the fact that she was tending to my hair. Must be the gay in me, loving to be primped and attended to.
She told me how she had stayed there last week working until 10 at night because the guy had asked her to help paint the walls. At that moment, I noticed that the light fixtures between each of the angled mirrors denoting stylist stations had been updated. They were simple sconces with a square of transluscent marbled texture complemented by her cloudy wall of gray. Below the "chair rail" molding (can't recall the proper term) about four feet off the floor was a tiled wallpaper of white with randomly imprinted bathroom words like "bubbles", "air", "refresh", "relax".
A random beatles song I couldn't place was playing on the radio and I felt like I was in a glimpse of Across the Universe. I dub thee "Prudence". The man working took a 10 foot lenght of pipe outside and balanced it across two trash cans to sit on it and straighten it out. At one point he had attracted the attention of the Indian gentleman that runs the GNC next door and brought him in showing off his renovations, explaining how the plaza was on its way to a huge growth with the new businesses moving in and how his various modifications would allow for specific psychological pleasantries that would keep his shop up to speed with the future development.
The woman cutting my hair had a habit of bowing with every gentle gesture for me to move to the chair to wash my hair and back and even moreso when I paid and came back to give her the tip.
I think all these senses, the massage, the fact that I had gotten my dirty chai beforehand and felt warm and caffeinated despite my lack of food intake, had made for a detail-worn experience culminating in putting my bulky peacoat back on and strolling back out into the clean, brisk cold envying my boyfriend for his strike and his full-on paid-for massage.
and now, and now...I can't even concentrate on a simple conversation spinning my apple around on the desk and all the attempted planning and timing and when I'm leaving and traffic and blah* - I'm sorry - I know this is bad foreboding, this lack in me. And I need it to change-- I need me to change--to make things work.
There was a good feeling today - it was coming from David Blue and this idea of the "eternal extra", from Vanessa Carlton played as wakeup music and stuck in my head all day, from noticing that a more successful fellow blogger had found a new motivation, and from seeing this tree shadowed on North Bergen high school on my way to work the way I used to say the most random things could bring me up out of a fowl mood, like a tree blowing in the wind... and also there was this pipe that had burst on 77th on the way down the hill, that was shooting up a great stream of water straight up into the air right in front of this perfectly yellowed tree. I think all this, these thoughts of going somewhere and of a unfogged determination to find what it is I need to be doing (a "prime" passing by?)--made me come to this point--with an eager determination to encapsulate and preserve these sentiments.
later:
blast of sugar high from a warmed up cinnamon roll and apple, only thing I've managed to get around to eating all day. has allowed me to get through this, force myself to complete a thought. both phones on either side of the monitor are flashing to answer their ever-filling box of messages and still plenty of day work. Thank you sugar and self-motivation.
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