Friday, January 29, 2010

Deafwish

Today a girl next to me with headphones began singing really loudly. I had headphones on too but I could still hear her. I looked across sideways to see what was going on. There was no way I wanted to make eye contact. If I did we were both fucked. What are you meant to do when you look someone who is singing loudly in the eyes? There's no walk out - everyone dies. It's like someone catching you smelling your finger. You're not doing anything wrong; you're savouring the smell of a small slice of flourless chocolate tart yet to the passerby it looks like you're some kind of digit sniffing pervert whose probably just done some sort of self prostate examination on the sly in the cafe's toilet. This suspicion is further enhanced and becomes an undeniable fact if a sliver of chocolate tart has unfortunately wedged itself under a fingernail.

So I pointed my eyes sideways like a year ten trying to look down the top of a young teacher while she marks his work. She hadn't realised she was singing, well I don't think she had. Perhaps she was in the moment, lost in the joy of music. She began doing a little bit of that breathy worble that's usually accompanied by hand movements that look like someone's dialing an old style telephone. It was bad. I turned up my ipod and pretended I was deaf.

A gazillion years ago when I was at uni I happened upon a similar situation but to greater degree. A girl was recording a radio show with the door open. Her head was back and she had a pair of headphones and was singing a Tatu song at top volume. I cautiously looked in and she was dancing with her eyes closed holding a ruler for a microphone. It made me laugh.

3 comments:

trav said...

u just never know what can happen on public transport

rick said...

taser time

SC said...

Egads! The fuzz!