Ju "Fella" Myriad

I run into somebody I know at random every single day in the city.  Not just the regulars at my work, but people I knew in high school, college, strange inter-collegiate and inter-scholastic extra curricular activities.  

But most frequently at work.  I ran into a girl who was involved in theater from my high school, and is getting her graduate degree in music from DePaul.  She was a senior and barely recognized me.  I must have devastated her with my refined, chiseled physique and sharp features.  I was, after all, a freshman when I knew her.  

The weird one was a couple of weeks ago.  In the middle of the afternoon, I'm usually pretty freakin' bored.  So when a customer comes in, I dish it fast and hard: 

"Hi, how ya doin'?  Can I get a drink started for ya?  How about something to eat?  An espresso machine?  What about twelve [Italian for Twenty] [trademarked blended coffee and milk concoction]s?"

A guy whom I don't recognize comes in.  I go in for said spiel and stop dead.  

"Terry?"

"Mike?"

Handshake.

I smile.  "What's up man, I haven't seen you in years."  

I hadn't.  This guy (whose name I'm masking with a pseudonym) was an acquaintance in my elementary school years through high school.  We were always cool with each other as I recall and I always found his antics amusing.  The last actual memory I can recall of him was in our junior year, when he mercilessly tortured our Spanish III teacher by bombarding her with phrases like "Señora, ¿fuma drogas?"

"Do you live up here now, Terry?"  Here, of course, being Lincoln Park.

"Yeah, man.  I'm managing for this construction company."

"So, you're like a foreman or something?"

"Yeah," he says, with a slight smirk.

I grab his drink for him and ring him up.  A pivotal moment:  Does he get it for free?  A discount?  Full price?  

The reasoning is difficult.  One could say for old times' sake he should get it for free.  It's also possible that I could get freakin' canned if I give out too many freebies.  But, even that could be a good thing (I do often fantasize about being fired for some reason or another).

Before I can decide, however, he says "So what are you doing here?"

"Well...just...auditioning, you know.  Trying to be an actor," I reply trepidatiously.  

"...cool."

He had that slimy "Well, look at that kid who was in all of the AP classes working at a coffee shop" tone.  

Suddenly, I have a flash of memory from junior high.  Him sitting at the large dining room table at my house with a bunch of other young guys.  Wearing blue shirts.  It's a Sunday night meeting for my Webelos den.  My mom is the den mother.  She's talking about an upcoming camp trip...and Terry makes a smart-ass remark under his breath about packing double the food...  

...for my mom.

I lift my head from the register...and give him my own patented smirk.

"That'll be $3.58."

Bucky Goldstein's Sweat House

Well my darlings, I feel like I've been out to pasture over the last week and I'm just returning from a cattle-drive.  Yee-haw!  I'm a fine arts cowboy, ridin' and ropin' abstract concepts so you can chow down on thick, juicy, socially critical tenderloins at your table tonight.

I think I'm going to let that grievously mixed metaphor go, for fear of eliciting any Brokeback responses.  

In some measure of seriousness, however, I feel exceptionally disconnected from the world around me over the last week.  It's probably because I haven't had as much time to diddle with my atrocious Fantasy Baseball team (is it sad that I took a break just then to diddle with said team?), peruse the latest offbeat news articles on Fark.com, or to keep up on The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs.  

Could it be that...(gasp) I'm BUSY?

Boy, it has been a WEEK, dearies. Auditions and auditions and working and eating sometimes and apartment hunting and rehearsing and scheduling more auditions and rehearsing and attending impromptu social events and moving people and apartment hunting and rehearsing and nibbling on olives.

I usually don't have a hard time keeping up on these things; it's only in times of reflection that I notice really how much I've done.  And suddenly it's early August.  Jesus, I'll be wearing fashionable sport jackets and hoodies in a month-and-a-half.  I'll have another show under my belt, and hopefully will have another to do.  Maybe a vacation.  

But that is SO FAR AWAY now.  My itinerary for just TODAY includes:

*Finalizing an apartment application and laying down a security deposit for said apartment

*Critical laundry-doing

*Assisting friend in preparing for theater/re benefit

*Submitting headshots to reputable small theater/re companies

*Don smart-looking suit and masculine-smelling hair grease

*Meeting lady-friend in Lakeview, then proceeding to said theater/re benefit

*Alcohol-induced blindness

Is it disconnection I'm experiencing or possibly...hyperconnection?  I'm so goddamned plugged-in that I've overloaded my dutifully multitasking internal circuit-breaker, leading to a system-wide power failure.  The answer to that supposition would then clearly be...sleep.  Which begs the question: why am I here, awake at 5:30 in the morning, writing this?  

I'm out of my freakin' mind.  

It's time to get one of those bulleted items taken care of, my children.  

Oh, and finally I would like to ask all of you for your prayers.  My future roommate and I discovered the most wonderful apartment I've ever seen in my four years in Chicago yesterday.  I won't say much about it for fear of jinxing, but I'll say this: it has a sauna.  You will all be invited over for schvitzing and cocktails if we get it.  Wish me luck.