Dotty Parker

hush, hush, shhhhh

Went with BrilliantEditor to a schmancy (Vaguely schmancy, but my life must have fanciness. Fanciness I say!) thing for John Kerry. My friend, I call him PrePrez, was supposed to stop by, but I do believe he got caught in traffic. It's so difficult at rush hour around here. Just yesterday there was a line of ten cars to get onto route 79! Ten! Even the deer had to wait to cross the road.

At any rate, I wore tall shoes. I was nearly as tall as Chewbacca. I already have the wild hair, so why not the height? That's what I thought at first. Besides, they're the only black shoes that I own that aren't lined with some kind of fur or kevlar. To keep snow and bullets and ice bullets away from my tootsies.

I discovered that being the height of a water tower, relatively uninformed (Like, hey! I came with that guy. He's swell.), and talking with tiny old women, while stooping slightly to return to human height and wobbling a bit as I'm not used to such a cumbersome pose, well, I discovered that I'm completely uncomfortable.

Ta dah!

So! I decided that I should sit. I decided that I should not sit by myself looking like the girl at the eighth grade dance in her too-tall shoes. I need an activity and I need to chit chat. Lord knows I can chit chat.

Chatting was not easy, however. People already had their conversations going. People knew me, but I didn't know them. We'd met before, apparently, but my mind had most certainly been on other things like making pancakes or keeping the dogs from biting them or wondering if I had left the iron on and was responsible for that terrible fire. I was wishing that I had paid more attention. Still, I vow that I will now have a thing to say when I don't remember meeting someone. I've not determined the script yet, but rest assured, it will be brilliant.

At last a savior came to join the conversation. Surely he didn't expect me to monopolize his evening, talk constantly and then punch him in the nose, but we all need surprises in our life, don't we? Of course we do. Happily the host began speaking, thus obviating the need for police intervention.

During these kinds of schmanciness there are too many people and too much noise. It's not like being at a bar, either, where I can just ignore people I'm not with. Here there's an obligation to be interesting without using naughty language (I didn't manage that) and without telling outrageous lies (which I did manage). There’s an obligation to meet people, at least a little. The obligation continues when I manage to recognize people and they recognize me and then we realize that recognition has ZERO to do with shared interest so we talk about gas mileage and the price of tea in China and how interesting lampshades can be. Multiply this impression by the Universal Gas Constant (8.3144 j/(oK mole), and you might have an idea that this was, for me, the delicate flower of all delicate flowers, a flood of noise and stuff and info and whoa.

I went outside because I started zoning out. The man from PhysicsComputerTown, who had much potential to be interesting, although I no longer cared, was pawned off on BrilliantEditor. PhysCompTown was happy and BE was in his element, I think, and I went outside to look at the hostas and daisies and astilbes (which bloomed nearly two weeks later than mine).

After a walk around the yard, I talked with the elections man about electronic polling and then tried catching BE's eye to say, "Yoohooooo! Time to go!"

We went to dinner and we ate outside because it was quieter (!!). I thought it might be fun to go to Madeline's to take home dessert, but there was no one behind the counter and five kids and an inattentive mom were there. One kid said to another kid, "I am your fairy godmother and I will give you dessert if you give me two hugs!"

We left before I screamed.

No dessert for me. So sad.

I am, however, home now. In the relative quiet I can hear my fingers typing and my head is becoming lighter as I send my nonsensical complaining to you instead of keeping it all to myself.

Posted by dotty at July 23, 2004 11:44 PM