We’re up at Griffith
Observatory, up on Mount Hollywood, fresh from the big room downstairs in which
a facsimile of the solar system is displayed, and in which I, who may look 92,
but am still four and a half at heart, got the giggles at the prospect of asking
the Sherpa, or docent, or whatever, such questions as, “How big is Uranus?" and
“What is Uranus’s average temperature?” We are in a long queue waiting to be admitted to a
sort of domed theatre in which we will see a presentation called something like
Our Wonderful Universe. A huge guy —
we’ll call him Igor — with an Eastern European-sounding accent and a date with
an Eastern European-looking blonde dye job quite brazenly walks to the front of
the queue, sighs self-satisfiedly, and gives everyone a look that demands,
“What are you going to do about it?”
I always feel at such
times as though the top layer of my manhood is being peeled off, as though,
even if no one else does, I should be the guy who confronts the asshole on the
common behalf. But the sensible part of me (the part so easily confused with
the cowardly) recognises some very obvious problems. Igor is around 30 years
younger than I, with biceps approximately as big around as my thighs. He puts
me in mind of an episode of The Sopranos
in which a big Russian mafia goon advises Paulie Walnuts, “I wash my balls in
ice water.” I have one working arm (I’m a few months away from having my right
shoulder replaced for the second time), and am wearing an expensive custom
contact lens in my right eye. I have recently spent $1100 on dental work to
make my smile more irresistible. His walloping me could damage me financially
as well as physically.
I think maybe what I might
do is charm him out of his ghastly behaviour. I think I will make my way over
to him with my big brown eyes all a-twinkle and say, “My friend, maybe it’s
different from where you’re from, but in this country we join a line at its
end,” beaming at him the whole time, as though we’re in on the same little joke. But then I picture him believing me to have embarrassed him in front of Ms. Baddyejob,
and replying, “And in my country, a real man joins a line wherever he fucking pleases, and breaks
the nose of anyone who dares challenge him.”
I will be hoping that,
by this time, others in line will see what I’m doing and, inspired by my
courage, make evident their support. Will Igor really want to take on half a
dozen universe-lovers, or suffer the opprobrium of their WAGs? But even if no
support is manifested, I must persevere. I will manifest gentle, avuncular,
disappointment, and say, “My friend, my hunch is that you’re much better than
this. Rather than all of us in front of whom you have queue-jumped
thinking you an awful person,
would it not be much more pleasurable to win our admiration by admitting your
mistake and going to the back of the line?”
At which point, one of
two things will happen. Others in the queue award me a small round of
applause, making me feel loved, and Igor see the error in his ways, garnering
applause of his own. Or, rather more likely, he will snarl something along the
lines of, “Get the fuck out of my face, faggot, or I will throw you halfway
down Mt. Hollywood and impregnate your wife.” I realise there’s another
possibility, more mortifying than the second. A woman will confront him, and
then I’ll really feel a woeful little
dweeb.
In the end, neither I
nor anyone else in line says a word, and I spend the whole of Our Wonderful Universe and much of the
early evening hating myself a little bit. Not even the memory of nearly asking the docent about the temperature of his anus restores my good mood.
