The Reason for Office Specials?

Yes, I am relying quite a bit on the ArcSoft program to colour my office specials these days. I think it’s because I’m getting tired of having to photo-edit out all the page-rippling and muddiness caused by washing the watercolour pencils on copy-paper. It probably wouldn’t be a problem if I had PhotoShop here but instead I have ArcSoft, which is about as refined and versatile as sea lion on land.

I think I need to upgrade the office special to draw them not on copy-paper but on water colour paper. I know, it won’t be much of an office-special if I do, but at least it’s still something I created it on breaks at work while scarfing a Fresco crunchy taco! I’ll have to reflect on this decision.

I joined a little women’s gym (and spa) recently. It’s a small gym with brand-new, beautiful machines that have their own dedicated flat-screen TVs in front of them so you can watch Perry Mason or Jerry Springer while hoofing it on the elliptical and treadmill. It’s clean, beautifully decorated, welcoming and quiet during the day. Today, I went there, and because the Gym is near what is called a “Service Center” but what is really a “Feed the Tweeker-Meth-Heads Facility”, I had a little… um.. encounter as I was leaving. As I was pulling out after my workout, I’d lowered the driver’s side window to let in some fresh air, because the Prius was stuffy and reeked mysteriously of horse for some bizarre inexplicable reason… and this short, very hard-ridden, wrinkly faced bottle-black haired harridan comes stumbling by from the service center and asks in a Wicked Witch voice: “Hey.. can I get a ride?”

My response was naturally… “Uh… No.” She then flips out and says: “Well then you’re a fat f**king whore!” and my kneejerk response was “Yeah… a fat f**king whore with a CAR!” I drove off giggling, watching her just go off on this screaming ramble as she crossed the lot.

I think this is part of the reason why scenes like my office special are so prolific inside my head. It’s this world. What a world we live in… what a really dark, bleak sort of place it can be sometimes. It’s hard for me to find empathy in my heart for people like Hagatha there, with her snaggle-tooth mouth and sour face. I can think about all the circumstances that lead people to drug abuse… to alcoholism… and in many cases, these are things I’ve gone through, my sisters and brother have gone through, and yet none of us are screaming like banshees at strangers in cars as we walk out of service centers. We are all products of our environment and our choices—and it can go either way for all of us. We can succeed to some measure, or fail. We can try to be strong, or we can give up and hope we’ll be taken care of.

A wise old friend of mine once said to me after having fallen very hard from very high; “We are *all* only one step away from the street.” Nobody should fool themselves that they are insulated from the same fate as Hagatha… The only thing we can guarantee is to make better choices when faced with difficulties, and not expect solutions to come to us. We are responsible for ourselves alone.

I’m in this frame of mind because I watched a documentary called “The Bridge” recently. I do not advise that just anyone watch it. It’s pretty bleak and depressing. It’s about the Golden Gate Bridge… and those who are drawn to it to commit suicide. The movie shows actual footage of people jumping to their death, and interviews people close to those who jumped. There was not a lot of hopefulness in this documentary. It was very, very sad and I've been in a sort of funk since I saw it. It teaches a hard lesson… there are people out there who simply do not want to be, or cannot be helped. This world is just too hard for them. They handle it by jumping off beautiful bridges--or turning themselves into bitter, screaming crones by marinating their bodies in chemicals and alcohol.

I handle the difficult world by drawing tea parties.