August 31, 2006

Prompt: “An Impression”

An impression is rooted in the moment. A stranger’s face is immortalized on first sight, without acknowledgement of its younger counterpart and without traces of its future form.

Monica was immersed in these deep – or maybe quasi-deep – thoughts at a little party on Park Ave. She knew only one other soul at the occassion, a woman named Amanda who phoned her spontaneously in search of an escort to this shindig. Five minutes into their awkward grand entrance into the 500 square-foot condo packed inch-by-inch with perfume scented-limbs and minty-fresh breath, her friend dashed away for a cigarette on the balcony.

Monica moved slowly about, desperately trying to make eye contact with another awkward soul hobbling about for social recognition. Not only did her efforts fail, but several women distinctly evaded pupil-to-pupil contact, leaving Monica superficially eyeing the bookshelf. To her surprise, she noted that the selection was loaded with self-empowerment books written by Dale Carnegie and shockingly, Ann Coulter. Left to her own devices, Monica attempted to feel deep by breathing oxygen through the knots in her chest and pondering the Buddhist sentiment of being in the present. Monica smiled to herself: damn she was good.

At last, Monica rejoices as a form enters her eyes’ periphery. At last! A lost soul was joining her at the bookshelf, carrying two drinks to boot! “Hey Joyce!” he said enthusiastically until she turned around in an un-Joyce-like manner.

“Oh sorry. I thought you were someone else.”

Great, Monica thought, as the frazzled man scurried away. And that margarita looked appealing. Too bad I made the impression of Joyce only to be denied a margarita.

I shall not suffer by this social rejection!, Monica reasoned. As dharma says: temptation for social popularity only leads to suffering.

Monica stood there.

August 17, 2006

Prompt: “What is concealed”

The truth sat quietly with them inhabiting the third chair at the restaurant table. It was a pleasant guest, keeping itself quiet vocally and careful not to nudge enough to draw attention to itself. However, the well-behaved, unspoken truth stirred so restlessly in the minds of its companions, it might as well have been one of those mariachi bands reducing a conversation into a guilty pause of respect. Or, it might be a senile parent muttering negative thoughts at a painfully inconvenient time, as painfully truthful as the observations of a child.

Amir’s gentle face danced in the candlelight, his lustrous eyelashes refracting the shadow of ringlets on his skin. Lynn’s glowing Irish freckles looked like faint constellations. Her blue eyes shined in an otherworldly manner.

No, the love story wasn’t Romeo and Juliet. No hymn of “there’s a place for us” accompanied their relationship. Truth made that clear since they sat down.

“What are you ordering?” Mary asked in a small giddy voice, still lost in last night’s rendezvous. With Amir painted in reality, three-dimensional in front of her, her thoughts couldn’t help but flash black to certain moments: the screen of sweat on his brow when he confessed his admiration, the way his fingers entangled hers from the back of her hand, a rock climber dizzy from an elevation rush.

But they had met long before this dinner encounter as two chemistry PhD students struggling through the state college. But the past – and even the present – mattered little to the face that Amir was from Morocco, Lynn was from Georgia, and neither was willing to live a life without family around them.