How shaking my behind made me who I am today...

A small visual sampling of my awesome moves...

In retrospect, it seems that during the time of adolescence, there were at least three distinct genres of people: the people who were "cool," the people who were willing to do anything or die trying to "be cool" and those who had college to look forward to for any small hope of a social existence. I definitely fit into the latter of the categories. Unlike my mother who, by the age of 12, was tall, beautiful and charismatic with long, formerly-blonde hair (she still claims to be blonde, but it's just not the case), I was a scrawny four-eyed runt with a big mouth and an overly-active imagination. The fact that I survived junior high school was by divine providence for certain. Had I been born in a more primitive time, I would surely have been phased out quickly under the auspices of "survival of the fittest," that is unless dorky butt-shaking and high kicks to eclectic and out of style music would have been considered a survival skill. If that were the case, I would have at least been able to puzzle my predators before making a quick getaway...

For me, college was the time I finally blossomed into the amazingly wonderful person that I am today. In art school, nearly everyone was a little off-center, so having a few bizarre personality defects wasn't looked at in a negative light. I went to a large state university where the visual art department was sequestered safely in a forgotten and undesirable corner of the campus. Aside from required general education courses, I rarely left the little art bubble which was always engulfed in a cloud of cigarette smoke, the aroma of cheap coffee and fumes of paint-thinner. It was there I learned how the fantastic side effects of prolonged sleep deprivation and mental over-exertion could bring people together to form unlikely bonds over seemingly meaningless common experiences. I also learned the importance of letting loose every now and then to deal with sleepless nights in the painting studios finishing countless assignments that have since been forgotten completely. All that remains are the friends I've held on to, and the knowledge that we were all part of the common struggle that has lead us all on sordid paths of ruin and financial instability. Every Thursday night, a particularly special group of friends would all meet at bicycle shop/bar for $1 local microbrews (oh, how very Colorado) and old music on the jukebox. To the tunes of James Brown, Michael Jackson, Devo and other fabulous entertainers from the murky recesses of the available albums in the machine, I learned that although I may not have looked very smart or conventionally "cool," my bizarre and inventive dance moves made me quite popular among the well-libated college crowd of artists, hippies and other friendly drunks.

Although my undergraduate years, all 6 of them, were filled with many good times and happy booty-shakin' memories, I quickly learned that life after school became progressively less exciting. Slowly all of the bicycle bar buddies from Thursday nights of yore went our separate ways and, for the most part, we all found new adventures to pursue.  Upon finding myself eventually in New York City, far away from friendly faces and familiar beers I had grown so fond of, I realized just how precious those quirky experiences were. I've also realized that age is a funny thing, and although I still believe myself to be both "young and fun," youth and amusement are very relative terms...

This winter I was thrust into a lively social situation during a seasonal job in holiday retail with Esprit on Fifth Avenue at Rockefeller Center. I worked there, folding sweaters and swiping credit cards during my evenings and weekends for three months, in which I decided to forgo sleep and/or sanity. The majority of the people I worked with were not born until after the ball dropped in 1990, and for the first time in my life, I was one of the "older people" in the group. This was a startling new experience for me. Given that even in my own age group I am quite a bit out of touch, to all of these people, I probably seemed like a space alien. I know very little of current TV, as I've not had cable since Friends was on the air, and I know even less of popular music. I should also mention that by the time I arrived at Esprit every evening, I had already worked 9 hour shifts at my "real job," and my mental clarity had been worn quite thin. In addition, I should also mention that when tired, my socially awkward tendencies burble to the surface and my concern over the rules of propriety wanes. As the environment was one of fashion retail in one of the most exclusive shopping districts in the world, a horrible mixture of utra-hip music was always pouring out of surround-sound speakers abundantly furnished around the store. To pass the time, I did what any frazzled idiot might do, and I would channel my youthful days of Thursday night splendor and make my own dance party on the sales floor of Esprit Rockefeller Center. Doing my own modifications of the mashed potato, the Charleston, strange references to high kicks by the Rockettes and variations of moves from Frankie and Annette films, I would blithely pass my time physically making fun of the Lady Gaga remixes and Rhianna songs I was subjected to as my coworkers stood by. After a while, I was accepted as the funny "older" nerdy guy who made people laugh by making an ass of myself. Some of the people would even join in and try to either match or out-do my awesome moves (which really isn't hard to do). Eventually, my willingness to be an idiot paid off and made me quite popular in a strange sort of way with the crowd of retail workers, mostly in their late teens.

From the experience, I learned that even in the unlikeliest of circumstances, a positive attitude and a lack of pride can go a long way in breaching certain social barriers. As time moves on and I slowly settle into being a "grown up," I know that I have a great deal of youthful "joi de vivre" to draw from in the form of moronic body movements. I am certain that even in the most taxing of circumstances, such as working the equivalent of two full time jobs at once, there is joy to be found when you can let go and dance like nobody's watching (even if you know people are staring and pointing and laughing)...

Shiny Sparkly Things...

Family picture in Dominguez Canyon circa 1989, dressed in our desert finest.

Sometimes I like to walk down Fifth Avenue in the evenings, in moments of Holly Golightly-inspired nostalgia, and look at the window displays in all the magnificent shops lining the streets. Sometimes this can be very difficult to do without becoming involved in an incident of physical danger brought on by directionally challenged tourists and bad camera angles that just happen to always intersect with your rib cage or chin at the wrong moment. More than once, I've had my brushes with near doom at the hands of cute Asian families or high school students exiting tour buses and flashing their cell phone cameras at everything. Even with all of the perils involved, when I am too antsy to go home for the night, but too poor to do anything that costs money (which is nearly always), I take my chances on the hazard-filled sidewalks and admire things, through the glass, that I could never, in a million years, justify owning myself.

I like to walk up from St. Patrick's Cathedral, all the way to Central Park South (avoiding the horse excrement) and then head toward Columbus Circle, looking at shiny sparkly things and the shiny sparkly people who actually buy them. Part of the fun is judging these people, and telling myself that it's much better to be poor and simple, staying grounded in reality, than it is to have everything in the world be actually attainable. It's always nice to be deluded about things like that, telling yourself ridiculous lies about how miserable these people probably are with their chauffeurs, fine dining, extravagant homes, health care, etc...  Feeling the hunger pains in my belly while walking by plates of food worth more than my whole life somehow seems like a triumph after enough of these little proletariat truisms run through my head. Money can't buy happiness, after all, or so say the people who don't have any of it...

One day, I ventured inside of Bergdorf Goodman, deciding for once to see what things looked like in these high-end stores without the glass barrier between. Aside from the mother and daughter from Jersey City who yammered on behind me, it was like entering a world where everything was bathed in some sort of heavenly glow and and joy was tangible and available to anyone with enough credit. When I made it to the top floor, home furnishings, I saw an older lady with her daughter examining several china sets and debating over which would be the most appropriate on their Christmas table this coming year. When I was a kid, we had a special set of Christmas Tupperware cups we would bring out each year for our festivities. Half were red, half were green, and they all had some sort of kitschy little white holiday design stamped on the sides in true 1970's fashion. We would fill them with store-bought "Holiday Nog" that my mother lovingly diluted with skim milk. The only debates that arose were generally less about the fine dinnerware, and more about who got to drink the olive juice left over in the can. I wondered if these ladies in Bergdorf's ever argued about who got to drink the last of the olive juice.

As I continued further through the home furnishings, I saw a married couple admiring a very lovely kitchen table and discussing the pros and cons relating to how the table would effect their living space. To me, the table looked very nice and quite sturdy, and then I thought of the table in our kitchen that my father used to support the engine of a broken-down Volkswagen microbus one bitter winter. It was extremely cold that year, and I remember there being a lot of snow that never seemed to stop falling. Somehow, my mother gave in and allowed the rebuilding of the engine to take place over several days in her kitchen, where she just sighed and looked the other direction, ignoring the thick black grease that ended up covering every surface within 5 feet of the pile of mechanical parts. I wonder if the husband in front of me was taking scenarios like that into consideration whilst admiring the craftsmanship of this fine dining table before us.

After I'd seen enough pewter and mother of pearl to last me for a good long while, I headed back down the series of escalators to leave the store. On my way down, I was accompanied on the moving staircases for 5 floors by two teenage girls discussing their upcoming summer vacations and what they'd have to buy in preparation. They went through a list of all the essentials like shoes, jewelry, more "seasonal" designer handbags, cocktail dresses, etc... The only summer vacations my family ever seemed to go on were backpacking trips in the desert. I remember to get us excited about it, my mother would surprise us with things like new flannel shirts, neon-colored flashlights or wool hiking socks. I think it was the flashlights that worked the best, especially my "hot green" flashlight that fit perfectly into my awesome "hot green" fanny pack. I imagined what these girls would do on a backpacking trip and how they'd look roaming about the desert in their cocktail dresses and new Jimmy Choos.

After a little chuckle under my breath, I finally made it to the ground floor. I said goodbye to the crystalline counters filled with beautiful little objects that shone brilliantly like mountains of diamonds under a sunset of heavenly-crafted lights. Although it's good fun to take a peek at this strange alternate reality every now and then, I am always quite happy to exit back into a world where things don't sparkle and shine quite so much.