Every Saturday, we’ll be posting a new illustration by David Lester. The Mecca Normal guitarist is visually documenting people, places and events from his band’s 29-year run, with text by vocalist Jean Smith.
Fancy MacAllister, customer service agent, gourmet food.
I’m sure my desire to please others is a defect that I’ve brought with me from childhood. With such flaws—mine and other people’s—I have mistakenly thought that simply knowing about them would somehow protect me from the second law of flaws. In and of themselves, flaws are neither here nor there, but, in phase two, flaws attract those who will exploit them. This, in my opinion, is the nature of human entanglement including romance, relationships and marriage. We seek out those with whom we will have the opportunity to examine our flaws and ideally, correct them. These exploiters do not have long, twisty moustaches, wildly wiggly eyebrows or other dastardly give-away features. They themselves are looking, albeit subconsciously, to engage for the same reason. To explore their flaws with others. This is why I steer clear of romance. It is no more about “nice” bottles of wine and beach-walking than ice hockey is about implementing anger-management techniques.
Having given up on romance—and therefore relationships—due to meeting a string of men with whom I had the opportunity to explore why I pick narcissists and losers, I now gravitate to employment to engage with humans in semi-sterile emotional environments. I seem to end up in jobs that involve a certain depth of communication, but can also be accomplished with both people walking in opposite directions.
“Where are the vanilla beans?”
“Over there,” I say, accompanied by a pointing index finger. This, to me, is a successful relationship. A healthy and efficient interaction, but things can escalate depending on the mood of the customer and where I’m at with my irritation level. The customer may arrive angry and ready to engage by exploiting the power dynamic within which they see themselves as superior and the clerk as subservient.
“Elemental Steamer,” from Janis Zeppelin (Smarten UP! 2003) (download):
