Time to Wallow in the Mire

From the spotlight’s glare to the edge of calamity, the camera on my shoulder drags me to the most exotic locales. But not everyday ends in a cross county manhunt, visiting VIP or Bigfoot sighting. More often than not I’m stuck in the muck of daily news, rushing from one forgettable setting to another with a lens that remembers and a desk that never forgets.

Take Wednesday for instance. I began my hump-day pacing around a country club ballroom, watching the blue hair set knock down enough chow to choke a busload of county inmates. Though it smelled delightful, but I wasn’t there to eat. I was there to bag enough shots to support a forty second on-air blurb, footage which takes far longer to procure than it does to watch on the six o clock news.

But this wasn’t my first time at the Snooty Buffet. With considerable aplomb, I strode in early and approached an elder statesman. If the captain of industry was put off by my less than formal appearance, the big lens I wielded made him keep it to himself. Minutes later I pulled the tiny microphone off his lapel and thanked him for his time and (less than) stellar comments. With the sound-bite I needed now simmering on my disc, I retreated to the room’s edge and waited for the inevitable oversized check to appear.

Twenty minutes later I was still waiting. Moneyed widows in too much mascara poked at their cantaloupe in slow motion as Chamber of Commerce types chewed overcooked eggs at half-speed. In the back of the room, I stifled a belch and tasted the coffee I had gunned down an hour earlier. ‘For a bunch of movers and shakers these old farts sure do eat slow,’ I thought for the not the first time since my arrival. If they didn’t hurry, I’d be late for my next few stops, probably end up missing my own lunch because Granny Moneybags’ designer dentures made her chew each bite a hundred times. Standing there, I wanted to jump on top of a table and scream at the top of my lungs...

“FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT’S SACRED, CAN WE PLEASE JUST GET ON WITH IT!”

Instead I flagged down a busboy, handed him my digital camera and smiled for a picture.

It’s a living.