Sunday, February 20, 2011

A Step Too Far (And Two Steps Too Slow)

Last Thursday, I played in an intramural basketball game.  Our team lost 104-50.  Worse, at the end of the game, the dominant team (i.e., not us) was whirling, dunking, leaping, laughing, alley-ooping, hitting half-court threes and generally being tall and strong.  (Picture the Space Jam aliens before everyone drinks the Jordan-juice at halftime). 

I came home deeply aware of my physical inferiority and my left groin muscle.  Then, I saw this:

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

Clooney's already got 788,859 "like"-rs to my 52.  (Who's counting?)  Now, he's also got a 10' X 4' mural in Cincinnati immortalizing him.  And look at it from further away:

Who's that he's touching?  That's right.  God.  YHWH.  Allah. 

I could be mad at George Clooney.  But I'm not.  He didn't ask to be up in the air with God.  He probably wishes the mural was out of sight.  He thinks he's of an unbecoming age, and seeing himself there on the wall is intolerable cruelty.*

So I blame Mark Schmidt, the artist, because like all artists, he's making life harder for the rest of us (specifically, me).  He's raising the bar.  Now if I'm going to be ready when the fame train pulls in, I can't just be published and have "like"-rs.  I have to be ripped so that when someone paints a mural of me, I'll look even better than that handsome devil up there.

So thanks Mark Schmidt.  Thanks.

By the way, your name is boring. And I can beat you at basketball.


*Okay, that one's a stretch.

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