HITTING THE START BUTTON

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED BY THE SOMERS RECORD (06-17-21)- Please remember small business in your town during this coronavirus pandemic

     I'm a musician at times, and I play in local eateries and drinkeries, so I like to go out and "take the temperature of the room," so to speak, and at least I'm polite enough not to take it the way my Mom used to take mine. Last weekend was the first time in quite a long time that the new normal seemed pretty close to the old normal. Coronavirus seemed like something that has gone the way of your "Partridge Family" lunchbox, Sea Monkeys and the cassette deck. I hope not because I still use my cassette deck.

     I went to one of my favorite hangouts, someplace I frequent every 15 months or so, and all the familiar bartenders were back at their battle stations. "The usual?" Alan asked without missing a beat, and produced it, and that's why real bartenders are professionals who are part of a culture that we've been missing out on during the pandemic. It includes being pampered a little bit, having someone cook for you, play for you, make your drink and bring it to you. Yes, I wish I could still wear my slippers and a bathrobe when I go out. Some habits are hard to break.

     The experience also includes being around other people, watching what they do when they're letting loose. It's how society evolves. It rubs off on you, and makes you feel like your good time is part of a bigger picture. It's also good to know that there are people out there who dance worse than I do.

     The scientists at the party lab weren't sitting idle all this time. They were hard at work developing new technologies for me to make fun of. The veejay was playing video versions of popular songs, and in the lower left hand corner of the screen, pictures of people in the crowd taken on their phones and texted to a certain number immortalized them for several moments, for a small fee I would guess.... 

     Although the quality of the photos looked like a cross between people just coming out of anesthesia and "The Blair Witch Project," the possibility of being discovered by a modeling agency that specializes in DWI mug shots more than made up for it. I wondered to myself, who's behind the wheel at the Standards and Practices Department for this? What if someone follows me into the bathroom and broadcasts a picture of me in a compromising position? Luckily there are no reports of me ever compromising.

     Just then the veejay vaulted out of his booth with what looked like a giant fire extinguisher and sprayed it into the crowd. I wish I had brought my chemical spectrum analysis equipment with me so I could determine if it was toxic or not. The last time I saw something like that, The Penguin had shot it out of his umbrella, and everyone dropped dead, temporarily. For all I know maybe somebody was on fire and I should be hailing the veejay as an American hero, but people just kept on dancing as if people spray with them stuff all the time.

     Music hasn't advanced much during the quarantine era. I'm not going to sound like your Dad or preach you a sermon on it or anything, but thou shouldst have something that resembles a melody as you cometh to the finish line of writing your song. One masterpiece had the lyrics printed right on the screen, and, like when somebody shows you their surgery scar, it doesn't improve the experience to actually see it right there in front of you. If Nicki Minaj has a secret admirer on the Pulitzer Committee, the joke will be on me.

     Someone broke a glass on the dance floor, and a gal took the time to clean up the mess. I thanked her and said, "You'd think someone who works here might do that," and she said, "I used to work here myself." So I guess the big rebound is going to be a work in progress. But in a flash I realized that I was nitpicking, curmudgeoning and complaining about anything and everything just like before, and it was a joyous revelation. That's when I'm seeing the world as it really is and enjoying my place in it. My personal pandemic is over.