The Walls Have Ears

I sometimes find myself malingering in the frozen foods aisle at Trader Joe's. Occasionally, if I'm feeling reckless, I even buy stuff which isn't on my grocery list.

As I hovered over the desserts section, eyeing a couple of treats, a millennial buddy bounced up and gave me a high-five. "Hey, Nancy-pantsy, what's happening?"

I shrugged. "Not much, except I can't decide which flavor of sorbet to buy. I'm kind of in the mood for lemon, but raspberry matches my lipstick."

"Get both of them."

“Good idea." I leaned on the handle of my cart. "So, what's new with you?"

Her face widened into a happy grin. "I'm really psyched. I just bought a manual typewriter."

"Great," I said.

"I found it online."

I nodded. "Somehow I guessed brick and mortar wasn't involved, but thanks for clarifying that."

She rolled her eyes heavenward in an attitude of ecstasy. "I love it. The clickety-clack of the keys makes me feel like I'm actually accomplishing something, even when I'm not."

"Manual typewriters have their charms," I said.

"You have one, right?"

I shook my head. "I used to, a long time ago, but not any more."

"Omigod, what happened to it?"

"I don't remember. I think I either gave it to Goodwill or traded it in for my first computer."

Her face registered primordial horror. “What? I'd never expect you, of all people, to succumb to the tyranny of technology."

"I didn't succumb to anything," I said. "At least nothing related to this topic."

 "Then why did you get rid of such a magical piece of machinery?"

I kept my voice level as I replied. "The neighbors complained about the noise. They said it kept them up at night."

Just Do What You Can

The first time I gave a slide show and talk about my artwork, I developed psychosomatic laryngitis a few days before my speech. My then-boyfriend, an actor, told me such incidents were common in theatre, a variety of stage fright. He taught me how to project sounds from my mouth by pressing hard on my diaphragm and exhaling loudly, resulting in a faint but intelligible "voice". He assured me that by combining abdominal thumping and a microphone, I'd be able to make myself heard.

 The class was an art appreciation class at the University of Minnesota, over 200 people. As I stood high on an elevated stage and surveyed the crowd filling the auditorium, I held the mike close to my face and explained why my voice was so weird. Some of the audience nodded in sympathy, but the rest kept their eyes on the floor. When I asked how many were artists, only a few raised their hands. Most were middle-aged and wore the exhausted expressions of working students.

My paintings from that time period were very straightforward; I hadn't yet evolved into my current surrealistic style. All I wanted to do was paint pictures and sell them so I could make a living doing my art. The crowd seemed to enjoy the landscape paintings, street scenes, and still lifes projected onto the movie screen during my talk.

Toward the end of my lecture, I showed a slide of a cow, explaining that I'd noticed the cow during a road trip through Wisconsin and decided to paint a picture of it.

A man in the second row raised his hand.

 I gestured in his direction. "Yes?"

 He stood up and spoke loudly. "Why did you paint a cow? Why not a horse?"  The expression on his face was kind; I could tell that the question was an honest question.

I pondered for a moment, and then asked in my teeny voice, "Why would I paint a horse?"

The man's response boomed up to me and ricocheted around the auditorium. "Because the horse, he is a noble beast, the king of the pasture."

I leaned forward and croaked brokenly into the microphone. "But the cow, she is out standing in her field."

The man thought for a moment. "Ah." He smiled, nodded and sat down.

In a small way, I think I changed the world that day.

Mine is Bigger Than Yours

Woe to anyone who tries to figure out my taste in movies based on the collection I store upstairs in a cardboard box. Many of them are culled from the free piles of apartment buildings where I've lived, or else I found them in a secondhand store, or else I got them as a gift from people who don't really know me (like Secret Santas).

I was watching one of those movies on a throwaway night last December. One of the main characters remarked (ruefully) that her life was very small. It got me thinking about my own earthly trajectory, which could look teeny to an outsider. I'm not prone to shark-cage diving or bungee jumping. I don't remedy failed love affairs with transcontinental jaunts. I've never been the captain of a space ship or discovered a rare species of tree snail. I've never even made my own pasta.

To the naked eye, it would appear that I have a very small life.

But the naked eye can't see the rollicking joyride of pure imagination going on inside my head. I'm usually on some wild adventure to locations which make terre firma seem shabby indeed.

Our mercantile culture strives to turn make magic into a commodity. I'm guilty of that myself, and it's led to some dark, soul-searching moments (as well as some stilted, rotten art). But in the end, when I can't seem to figure anything out, I throw up my hands and go back to painting and writing and doing whatever humble, money-generating things it takes to keep my little ship afloat.

Wave to me when I sail past...

Snow Job

My phone rang while I was adjusting one of my easels, a lightweight thing which collapses at odd moments for no particular reason. Despite almost tripping over my model's feet (in other words my own feet, since I was painting a self-portrait), I managed to run to my living space and grab the phone before it kicked into voicemail. "Hello?"

 "May I speak with Nancy?" The voice on the line was male, the kind of baritone which usually emanates from leading men in chick flicks

"This is Nancy," I said, fluttering my eyelashes at myself in the mirror above the phone.

It turned out that the caller was a telemarketer. He'd telephoned to try to sell me something I had no intention of purchasing. I listened to his entire sales pitch, though; I didn't want him to stop sending that delicious voice in my direction. When he finished his spiel I said, "Sorry, I can't afford it. But thanks anyway."

His tone turned sympathetic. "Hey, are you getting blasted by the weather?"

I looked out the window. Snow was swirling in all directions, buffeted by the cruel, icy wind, but the last thing I wanted was for a dreamboat telemarketer to feel sorry for me. "No."

"I thought the entire Midwest was getting pummeled."

"Not us. Minnesota isn't really the Midwest." I pulled the hood of my sweatshirt over my head. "Why do you ask? Are you getting blasted by the weather?"

"I'm in L.A.," he said. His voice was smug.

"Oh, I used to live there," I said in a breezy contralto. "L.A. gets blasted by other stuff, like earthquakes and smog and traffic jams."

His tone grew serious. "I know.  I can see Hollywood Boulevard from my window, and it's gridlock because of some big film premiere."

"Traffic is never a problem here," I said. "Minnesotans are very efficient." I leaned forward for a better view of 4th Street, where cars were snarled in the snowstorm, spinning their wheels as they tried to inch forward. 

"I still can't believe you didn't get hit by that storm. The news said Minnesota has blizzard conditions."

"Maybe somewhere in Minnesota, but not where I live. Today is sunny, and the sky is blue as a picture postcard."

"I thought California owned the sun," the telemarketer said.

"We have a different sun here," I said. "It's because we're so isolated."

"But sunny or not, Minnesota is so cold. How can you stand it?""

"I live in St. Paul. It's warmer here because of the river." I stood up."Well, I should go. There are lots of parties going on tonight, and I'm invited to all of them."

After I hung up the phone, I sat for awhile gazing out my window at the bleak winter cityscape, trying to remember why I moved back to Minnesota from Los Angeles. Yeah, L.A. was expensive and polluted, and the earthquake threat was scary...but the weather was perfect almost every day.

Suddenly I remembered the problem with Los Angeles: everybody was always trying so hard to impress everyone else, I could never tell whether people were lying or telling the truth.

I hate it when that happens.

Gaggle, 2013, oil on canvas, 12" diameter

Baby Talk

Do you ever ponder the puzzle of your personality?

I do.

While I was rummaging in a cupboard today, looking for the circus peanuts I hid from myself last Halloween, I located a new source of information about what makes me tick: my baby book! The slim volume was wrapped in tissue paper and nestled next to some photo albums. It's a pretty pink satin thing with ribbons and bows, and the title reads The Story of Our Baby. My mother handed it to me several years ago and said, "Take this. It's yours." I brought it home and immediately lost it in my lair before I had a chance to read it.

When I found the book today, I flipped through it in idle curiosity. My mother was a biologist, and most of her entries read more like notes from a science project than chronicles of human life. Just when I was about to stow the book away and move on to my next destination, some passages caught my eye. Etched in my mother's sensible cursive were smatterings of tales from my infancy and toddlerhood. I'll spare you the details, but here are some highlights: on Christmas I was more interested in the tree than the gifts. Many of my favorite playmates were boys. I adored coloring books. And on my 4th birthday, my mother wrote, "Mamma expected 9 and 15 showed up. Seems Nancy had invited the whole neighborhood."

Those tiny portraits of me, penned by a mother who wasn't given to flights of fancy, tell me more about myself than all those free online personality tests I took earlier today.

(But just in case you're wondering: I passed the "Are You Neurotic?" personality test with flying colors; the wardrobe evaluation pegged my age as 18; the food questionnaire said I'm an easygoing forager; the "How Picky Are You in Love?" quiz advised me to raise my standards; and the "How Effectively Do You Spend Your Time?" survey told me to turn off my computer and go PAINT.)

GOODBYE...

Tabula Rasa, 2016, oil on canvas

Haste Makes Waste

Silly me, I never seem to get around to running my errands until half past noon, which means I often end up standing in long, slow-moving lines.

Last week as I stood in a queue at a bank, I heard the man behind me mumbling under his breath. At first his words were muffled, but eventually the clarity and volume of his mutterings increased. He seemed to be upset about having to wait too long for the next available teller. At first I didn't want to turn around and look at him, because I didn't want to encourage his rant, but eventually my curiosity got the better of me and I sneaked a glance over my shoulder. I found myself staring into the bloodshot eyes of someone who resembled the archetypal "angry man" who may or may not have voted our most recent U.S. President-elect into office.

"There are only two teller windows open," the angry man said. "This is an outrage: I've seen four other tellers walk past and go into the back room." He seemed to be addressing both me and the man standing behind him, a fellow wearing an expression of good-humored neutrality.

Before the election happened, I might have also assumed an expression of good-humored neutrality, if only to avoid conversation with the angry man, but these days I find myself acting differently. In a firm and practical tone I announced, "That's because it's noon. People are on their lunch hour."

"That's no excuse," the angry man said.

Suddenly I felt very tired. I repeated a variation on what I'd just said."People need to eat lunch."

The good-humored man smiled and said nothing.

"I'm impatient, and I admit it," the angry man said.

 "Then go ahead of me," I said.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes," I said. "I'm not in a hurry."

Just then a teller window became available. The angry man thanked me and walked away. I said to the good-humored man, "I only did that because I wanted to get rid of him, but if you're in a hurry you can go ahead of me as well."

The good-humored man smiled a big, sexy grin. "I'm not in a hurry."

And he wasn't.