My favorite movie of all time is Out of Africa. One of my favorite lines (and I have many, including "Sh, shoo, shooooooot her!")is "When the Gods want to punish us, they answer our prayers." I should have paid attention, as that same kind of prediction has come along to bite me on several occasions.
First one. My friend Caren and I were out at a Motown Dance club - the Crush Bar in our early 20's. We sat at a table with our glasses of wine, or maybe a Tequila Sunrise talking about our singledom and how we planned to overcome it. We fantasized about our weddings, our careers, our futures in general. I remember sighing and saying, "I just want to meet somebody funny and nice." We finished our drinks, got asked to dance, danced, sat down, danced more. I was dancing by myself when a guy appeared before me and started dancing with me. He was nice and he seemed interested in me. We talked as much as you can in a loud bar environment. He asked for my phone number. I'll be darned if he wasn't a comedian. Caren asked him when he'd be performing next and said we'd go see him. The very next day, he called me. I called Caren right away and we giggled and reviewed our evening. She asked me if I planned to go the Comedy Store to see him perform, and I said, "I don't know. Maybe." She said she'd go with me and we should definitely go.
Well, we did, and long story short, Steve and I started dating. He was very nice, very funny, and very attentive. I was used to being the pursuer, not the pursued, so it all seemed very nice. Everything was good, except maybe one thing. I maybe should have thought to specify a few more characteristics besides funny and nice. While those are splendid qualities, I realized it might be nice to have a few others to go along with them. I don't know, smart, energetic, ambitious, grown up? Because as nice and funny as Steve was, it was pretty much all he was.
We eventually broke up. I'll always think of him with fondness, but long term potential we didn't have.
Come to years and years later, I'm now in my 50's, and embarking on a new passion of writing, thinking of turning it into a career. I love doing it, and have had some positive feedback from friends and family and even a few people I don't even know. I've had a couple pieces printed in our local paper, "The Palisadian Post" and just recently, achieved my goal of having a piece published on the Huffington Post. I am thrilled about both of those.
So, you might ask, how could you have been more specific? Well, that takes me back to graduate school. Usually when one is in graduate school, it's to hydroplane you into a well paying career. I got it half right in that regard. I got my MBA from UCLA! Whoot Whoot. But here's where I went wrong. I specialized in Non Profit Arts within the general MBA program. And it seems that's what I'm now earning from my art. NON PROFIT. Maybe that time I shouldn't have been so specific.
