Chapter 53: Karaoke is like Hitch Hiking

the Further Adventures of Trashy Drifter

Chapter 53

Karaoke is like Hitch Hiking

So, I am no longer a grizzly guide.

 Through some kind of karmic sweep up involving a gigantic invisible broom and dustpan, I have been made available for the next dance, but at this point, I am still the shy chubby girl with the floral dress meekly standing next to the punch bowl with my heart pounding and my palms sweaty, hoping I’ll be asked.

It would seem that it’s time for me to move on to the next chapter of my life, but right now, I have no idea what it will be. I’m on that blank page they sometimes put between chapters to make the book seem weightier.

I got up to start writing this because my head is so full of possibilities, hopes, fears and imaginary music that I felt behooved to finally spill a long overdue chapter of my life’s blood across a blank page. A message in a bottle.

The spring has arrived and daffodils and crocuses are busting through the green grass to the sound of frogs croaking and chainsaws clearing winterkill. Backyard BBQ’s and brush pile fires fill the air with a sure anticipation that long days of sunshine are coming. Veteran coasters who have been scraping by for years blink and smile. Those of us learning to get by on scraps and shreds hope and strive. Treeplanters put on their boots and bags, fishermen drag their nets from the lofts and some of us scratch our heads and wonder which way to jump.

After the bear season ended last year I dove into a bunch of projects and hobbies, all the while keeping my ear to the ground about getting some sort of permanent, stable employment tied around my neck. We looked seriously into going overseas to teach again. I turned down Saudi Arabia, but we were keen to work in Brunei, which didn’t pan out. I started an afterschool singing group at the elementary school, MC’d special events at Mt Washington, played a few gigs with the Dukes of Dodge, storytelling at festivals and libraries as CPTN THNDRPNTZ!!! Started a regular ceilidh, acoustic jam night, started a theatre company that did live improvised soap opera, became an apprentice stonemason and of course, served as a karaoke host.

Did you ever notice that karaoke is like hitch hiking? If you’ve done them both, then you know the uneasy, queasy feeling that you can get as you are taken for a ride by someone that you’d rather not have at the wheel. But no matter how you paw and clutch the door handle, there’s no way out, at least not until the end of the song. When someone gets that mic in their hand, they have the steering wheel and everybody’s ears are taken for a ride, like it or not. Sometimes that wheel/ song is a great and invigorating ride that renews you with hope and enthusiasm and philanthropy. It’s a great excursion in a sweet vehicle with a friendly competent motorist who buys you lunch and drops you off at your long sought destination and heart’s desire. Other times it feels like you’ve crashed in the ditch and rolled a few times and landed upside down in a bog before catching on fire by the time that a song has been thoroughly butchered, humiliated and ground into the pavement like festering roadkill that was once a sweet and nimble forest creature.

Actually, I quite enjoyed it. However, my enthusiasm for karaoke as a martial art and perhaps my bombastic southern preacher-like host stylings were not universally applauded. So, due to some mutterings and mutinous apostasy, my reign as karaoke lord was chopped short and my head tumbled from the guillotine and into the basket to be devoured by mangy vermin. At least that’s how it felt when that dreadful day arrived that the aforementioned giant karmic broom descended upon me and swept me up and snapped the tethers that kept me connected to my solipsistic concept of my place in the universe.

 So, here I am, here we are. The future is an open horizon of endless possibilities.

Now, if I just knew what to do next…