Me and My Shadows

Last night I received another one of those writing contest notifications. This time, the task, should I choose to take it on, is to write a memoir essay or a personal story. Not as daunting as trying to write about the Colorado Plateau, but daunting all the same. Where do I begin?

For ideas, I started scanning my three blogs, beginning, of course, with the ground breaking (only in the sense that it was my first) "Narcissist's Tale." I wonder if the contest judges will get sucked in if I open with the phone sex episode. All I know is I'm going to have to dig deep for something memoir worthy; the present is about as blank as the view outside my window this morning, which is pure, blizzard white.

I suppose day one of my career in yoga retail yesterday should be newsworthy, but my biggest sale was to myself. Warnings of apocalyptic snowfall had kept most sane people out of the malls, and since my on-the-job training consisted of trying on almost everything in the store, naturally I found myself spending my first day's salary (and then some). Let's just think of it as an investment in my future there.

Which, to tell you the truth, does not seem promising. The most challenging part of my day -- outside of feigning friendliness to the few brave souls who entered the store -- was the death defying ride home through the beginnings of what has actually more than measured up to the dire predictions. I spent a good portion of the dead hours in the yoga store reading the employee instruction manual on how to make sales. I am now crushed to know that all the compliments I've ever received when walking into a store were simply part of a checklist.

I was also shocked to learn that some shoppers are sent in by "corporate" as spies, and are asked to fill out lengthy evaluations about the quality of your greeting, service, and general attentiveness. Those corporate types think of everything; the faux shoppers have to identify you by name and physical characteristics, so good luck pinning your foul disposition on a coworker. Most surprising was the notion that a salesperson's failure to repeatedly tap at a customer's fitting room curtain to offer up additional garments is a negative. For me, the pestering is the kiss of death; it's why I avoid certain stores.

Like I said, the present doesn't offer much in the way of fascinating memoir material, so I'll be digging through prose about phone sex and bikini waxes and botox beauty queen attorneys. I could, of course, talk about Punxsutawny Phil's failure (frankly, this winter, I think it was not failure but refusal) to see his shadow today, but Groundhog Day has already been written.

I'll think about it tomorrow. For now, I'm working on my customer service skills. "It's not the pants, honey. Your ass is fat."