WEEKLY WRITER'S PATH #27
I’d been meaning to write about the clouds on Thursday, anvil-shaped thunderheads ten miles high and thirty miles across, but life got very complicated.
At 3pm I was sitting in the courtyard of our neighborhood shopping mall staring at the wild colors of the xeric garden in full bloom: salmon, red and white roses, coneflowers with neon pink petals, fat bushes of lavender heavy with bees, white protruding butterfly bushes—all interspersed with crawling primroses and sage—gramma grass stalks pinning it together like bobby pins in wild locks.
I was breathing and this was a good sign. There was food next to me in clear recyclable plastic boxes. Some of my favorite food: cold fried chicken, a stuffed spring roll with peanut sauce and peach tea. Asher sat next to me enjoying vegetable egg rolls. The sun was shining in between the enormous clouds but we had a shady spot.
There was a giddy, stunned after-blow to my nervous system that came from my decision to laugh at my predicament instead of hitting my head against the wall. I’d just finished an hour’s design session with an impossible client and instead of a freefall into despair, I was resilient, like a trampoline; I’d been trampled on and I bounced back. I didn’t get paid for my work, but it was only one hour and I was recovering my balance by eating protein and vegetables in a flowering garden with my son for company.
We designers all have clients like this: They send you a Word document “just to give you an idea” of the layout, all flattery when they demand “You’re the designer—show me what you would do.” Then inch by inch, they start asking you to follow their typed document.
Out of a roll of 50 fonts they are only comfortable with the five on their own PC, and they think comfort is good for design. They ask you what you think of the copy and you point out the repetitive phrases while they argue each word is necessary. Then they ask you why you can’t make it look like the ad in a publication which was done with 30% less verbiage. They insist, after 45 minutes that they are not liking what they are seeing.
This was when I said it wasn’t working, let’s just stop. She offered to pay for my time, but I declined. I began to wonder, How did I end up in her little drama?
After the door closed behind her, I wanted to scream. I went into my bathroom but decided screaming wouldn’t help. I wanted to hit my head against the wall, but I remembered the last time I did that. I felt like sticking my whole head under the cold water faucet in the tub; that would feel good, but I would be a mess. The room was so sunny it was surreal. Raindrops started whipping against the window. I went back into the living room and saw that she was pulling out of the driveway.
“Are you hungry?” I asked Asher who was playing Star Wars, calmly slicing droids in half with his blue light saber. “Not really,”
“Let’s go get some lunch,” I said, ignoring him. “I didn’t have time to eat breakfast and I need to eat before I crash.”
So we were sitting in the garden of the agora when I remembered what a friend had just said to me: Santa Fe has a way of testing you. You think you’ve lived here 25 years and the test is over, but when you start something new, this city just doesn’t work like any other. You need to see this new business through a full year. It doesn’t have to be graceful, but you have to hang on.
That was a test, then, I decided. Did I pass? I didn’t travel down to the pit of despair because I couldn’t make a client happy. I would still feel open to working in the moment with a client as I designed, just not that particular client. Would I be able to recognize that type of client in the future? If I paid attention to the signs, I would. So yes, I decided, I had passed the test. I was still hanging on.
I took a sip of tea but it smelled bad. Asher thought so, too. I asked if he would return it and get our money back.
At that moment my phone buzzed. It was Linda, my business loan counselor.
“I have good news for you,” she said calmly. “They approved your loan. Congratulations!”
Her voice was the sound of the universe answering.
