ConFUSION Soiree

I was as cool as a breeze till 4pm.

Some madman decided to let me loose on the great unwashed and do a public reading of my work.
I got an email about some palaver and apparently said yes.
I must have been on meds.
I thought I would arrive by train - (despite the fact that this meant I would have to leave town and come back as it is only around the corner) toting my diary and other sensational things.
He  described me as "the wonderfully perceptive and funny writer and blogger" which has stroked my ego no end, but is in fact an admission on his part that we have in fact, never met.
In real life I resemble Bernard Black from "Black Books" with a foot of ash on the end of a fag, ordering minions around, behaving like a minor deity, becoming irritated by people who cough or laugh in the wrong places, and spending an inordinate amount of time refusing to go anywhere that I might have to engage.
What shall I read?
What, far more importantly, shall I wear?
A Miu Miu and a bandana with strings of beads?
A Mama Cass Kaftan with strings of beads?
Or just strings of beads and heels?
Black head to toe with kohl rimmed eyes and a beret seemed to be the ticket. 

A number of colleagues and advisors had suggested ways I might do this.
"Bring something hilarious and ham it up, do the accents, they will fall around the place" says Man number 1.
"Bring something poignant and moving and slow your reading right down, they will be in floods" says Man number 2.
"Bring something that you wrote the night before and heckle the shit out of them, it'll prepare you for your own one woman show" says Man number 3.
In his defence he may have been Brahms & Liszt.

 I finally decided on a short piece from the upcoming Memoir – Little Missus Up & Down and decided to print it. My printer had other ideas and coughed feebly as it ran out of ink mid page. 

 I continued to breathe.

 I would print it in the library around the corner. The lovely girls who run Zen Beauty Bar had decided to give me the Mother and Father of all makeovers and so thinking two birds, one stone, I installed myself behind their counter, wet of hair and purple of face and took a number of telephone bookings for the sun pod and shellac nails, as I stared at the hieroglyphics on the screen in terror. 

The programme won’t open, and keeps announcing that the files may be corrupted. 

 Breathe Michelle, breathe I admonish myself.

I felt like Yoda in the chair as an army of tiny beauticians ministered to me, like those birds that live on a water buffalo’s back.  The pages won’t print, and I am deciding can I write out the whole thing in the time left. The hairdryer blew up with only one side of my head done, and I stepped into the Frock Shop frock and debated having a little lie down. 

My breathing has become ragged and I am a tad discommoded.

 The false eyelashes are hanging a bit crooked on one eye, and I look a teensy bit drunk. A drag queen face stares back at me from the mirror while I try to remedy the situation. He who must not be named says I can borrow his tiny netbook and I exhale when my memory stick works.

In my innocence I thought there may have been 5 or 6 hippies and a Bichon Frise at the reading.

 Oh, dear sweet gentle reader, the place is packed. 

They can’t get in.

 They are standing in the hall waving wine bottles in brown paper bags, they are peeping in the windows from the main street. The music is awesome, a man playing an acoustic guitar who sounds like Zeppelin.  I am behind the counter ogling a coffee roulade and feverishly unplugging the soup tureen to charge the netbook. Everyone is whisperingly asking if I am nervous.

 I am now.

The MC formerly referred to as the madman announces my name and I beat my way through the throng with my technology in my hand. I swing around on the high stool and nearly end up facing the window instead of the crowd,   there is an expectancy with this crowd and a hush descends post interval while I falteringly begin. My opening line is about my Uncle Eugene.

Girly Dooley was a Pork Butcher on Tullow Street -  he threw slices of ham and corned beef around the shop into the startled faces of the headscarfed women sitting chatting on the window sill.

So far, so great.  My hands are shaking so much I can barely tap the screen for more.

And then it happens -  the screen goes blue.

A bead of sweat runs down my nose. 

I tell the audience what happened as they are always in on the joke. When they stop laughing, one wag shouts up – “Just talk to us”.

As if.

My half printed pages are crowd surfed up to the top of the room and after much hilarity I begin again. The hilarity continues. I wonder should I stop to let them get their breath.  The last line is We found her shoe on the roof – and as I read it, I come back into my body and  the room and look at the laughing faces and exhale.

They have asked me back.

A complete stranger shakes my hand on the street the other day remarking that she almost choked on a dessert AND almost wet herself. We drank our tears, she remarks.

The Fusion Soiree event takes place on the second Friday of every month so next one is coming soon. Be warned and go early to get a couch .

 Café Fusion on facebook  – cafefusionwexford@gmail.com

M.D.M.

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