Hey! I took a few days off, but I'm back! I could pretend I've been working really hard on short stories about this trip, but I really just baked and went swimming with C and Ab (you've seen them on my insta story) and learned this Hamilton Evans dance that is absolute fire. If you don't spend your spare time watching dance videos on YouTube, you should.
What's left, then, before I head back out on the road? A final post about Elan and Michael (spoiler: it's turned into two posts), then posts about my final shadow stop last weekend in Riverside. I'll probably catch up just in time to leave again . . . perfect timing!
I absolutely loved my time with Michael and Elan. (Now that I got in a non-original, non-informative introductory statement, I'll start saying things that are actually interesting, or something.)
Michael did that art on the wall, the print of their dogs. Their dogs have passed away, but they inherited Michael's sister's cat, which you can see on the couch. But they both claim that they "aren't cat people," so I'm passing on the message.
I arrived on Wednesday afternoon. I'd driven down that morning from the Bay Area, which, if you've heard that phrase your entire life and don't really know what it means, see my very geographical explanation in my last posts.
When I pulled up to Elan and Michael's home, Michael introduced himself and showed me around the house. Elan, he informed me, had been unable to get back into town from work and would be arriving the following day. We sat in the living room talking for at least an hour, maybe two. Michael was over-complimentary of my crazy idea ("I think it should be required," a sentiment Elan echoed when I met her). He mentioned it in light of Dirty Jobs, the show on TV where Mike Rowe interviewed people with difficult or undesirable jobs; I loved that analogy.
He asked me where the idea for The Summer Shadow came from. My answer to this is different each time depending on what I'm thinking about at the moment, but this time I talked about learning how to have important, honest, genuine conversations with people once I got to college. Because I had no friends. Because I moved four states over. Because I realized that if I wanted friendships founded on Christ, I needed to be brave enough to talk about Christ. Cool story, I'll tell it sometime.
This is the tree at the top of the hike!
Anyway, we also talked about their neighborhood and his past jobs and current job. He was the creative director at Klutz books, he worked in marketing for the Koosh ball, and other sorts of random, California-classic "i've-heard-of-that-but-never-realized-real-people-worked-on-it-and-now-I-know-one" way. Also, a job appeared on his phone screen while we were talking—his casting agent had an audition for him for a commercial. (!!!!!is this normal). It called for a dad-looking man who would be flipping burgers at a tailgate; the email said a "normal to average" looking male. We laughed at that description for the next three days. "Normal to average," he'd say, "is the same thing."
Anyway, we followed that two-hour conversation with a hike, and we talked for two more hours then. He told me about discovering that he could draw in high school, and the slow evolution that followed as he turned out of a shy person and into an artist. He even got onto student council because his posters were so good. And once he was on it he did nothing, he claims, and his election now seems like less of a good idea because he has to help plan class reunions.
casual view. that's the griffith observatory on the far left!
When we got home, we started talking again, until 7:45 when Michael started making dinner. He'd recently decided to learn how to cook and has been ordering Hello Fresh, so we had Dukka-crusted chicken (I linked the google search for you; we didn't know what it was either). He did it all without letting me help, claiming that he needed to know he could do it himself. Which of course he did without any issues, and it was delicious. The chicken came with sweet potatoes. It also came with sugar snap peas, which was the only hiccup in the preparation. I've attached a picture of the instructions so that you can see how easily the mistake could happen: "Add sugar," so he added sugar, just a dash, then went back to the instructions, "snap peas." He started laughing. He'd added sugar. Instead of adding sugar snap peas. So we ate them, and called them sugar sugar snap peas.
the chef himself!!
see how you could just read "add sugar?" so he did!
Over dinner, we had another two-hour conversation, this time about politics, and it was my favorite conversation I've had about politics in a long time. I'd say we're each accommodating, sensible citizens, if I can make that claim. I agree more with him about politics and the world today than most of my friends. Both of us are mild-mannered about politics, so even that was kindred and pleasant. Conversations are such a better way to spend an evening than TV. Which is my reflection on the end of that night, and also another topic of conversation Michael and I touched on along with politics.
The next day, Michael told me what Elan would have been doing, if she'd been home—working in her office, eating lunch at a cute health-food-y cafeteria place called Lemonade—so that's what I did. She was set to get home in the late evening, so that afternoon, he and I went to audition for the commercial.
The commercial audition—a bunch of people, organized by type, a bunch of rooms, organized by number. Michael signed in, memorized his lines, waited his turn, went into the room, and then we left. Except it took longer than that sounds, because Michael was early and casting was late. Fascinating experience.
creeper picture I took of Michael waiting for his big moment
That night, we ate at a place down the street, then I worked on a blog post while he ran to the grocery store to get food for Elan. While we waited for her flight to land, we watched World of Dance and So You Think You Can Dance.
SYTYCD (because, in addition to being the best show, is also the worst-named show, so it requires a lengthy and annoying acronym) is basically the only TV show I care about or watch. Michael had talked about these shows on the way back from the hike the day before. He had been explaining to me why World of Dance's in-the-round stage doesn't work, why Nigel is a good judge, and why the camera needs to cut between takes less often.
Few people watch these shows, so it's always fun to find someone else who does. But a dad-aged man who is conversant not only on the production and cinematography but also on all the dancers is an absolute rarity. So I had a blast talking about Teddy Coffey with someone who knew who he was. (If you don't, you should.)
This is Michael, explaining to me the problems with World of Dance's cinematography. Amazing.
That night, Elan got home. WOW I love her. But I wrote so much about Michael that for your sake and my sake and their sake, we'll give her her own post.
But I loved my time with Michael. Here's his website for his creative work, and here's the one for his musical group. He is funny and interesting and engaging. I liked talking to him, sometimes because he was so good at listening. And sometimes because he was so good at talking that I didn't have to talk. Usually people do one or the other; it was impressive to meet someone who can do both. It was also nice because when I was chatty or curious, i could talk, but when my introvert-self was exhausted, I could nod and smile. (And still listen! But not have to try as hard.)
Michael did comedy improv for years. The one rule of comedy improv, he told me, is "yes, and . . ." Regardless of what someone says to you on stage, you must agree, and only then may you add your own idea. I'm not in the business of deciding whether to like people or not. But here's how I'd characterize Michael, if he were going into a book: he's the type of guy you feel like you should like less and less once you know him, because he's better than you at everything. And the more time you spend with him, the more things you find out that he's good at. But the more you hang out with him, the more you like him, because he's the person who always gives a "yes, and." He's amenable and interesting; Elan apologized for not being at the house for the first day I was there, but I think spending the first day with Michael and the next one with her was absolutely perfect.
