I've been noticing that a lot of bars around Boise, at least the ones I go to, have lots of mirrors. The Neurolux is covered in them, but short people might not be able to see themselves because they're up pretty high on the wall. Pengilly's and the Cactus Bar also have mirrors directly behind the bar. Interestingly, the bar is where most of the loners sit. When I go into a bar by myself, I usually sit at the bar. And I get distracted by my image. I catch myself trying to see my face and shoulders from different angles. What do I look like when I'm drinking? I'm not sure if this is vanity or curiosity.
I sat down next to a man at a bar and ordered a Miller High Life. I wondered about how the type of beer you drink reflects your personality. Then the man next to me asked me if I wanted to hear a joke. I said sure. I'm not sure what it was: the joke itself, the delivery, or the general melancholic attitude of the man that made it not funny. I couldn't even force out a fake laugh, and he quickly said he had a better one. Same reaction. Do the jokes we tell also reflect something about our personalities?
I changed the subject, and I asked if he'd do an experiment with me. Someone recently introduced me to an interesting activity called a Blind Contour. You look at yourself in a mirror and try to draw yourself without looking at the paper and without the pen leaving the paper. Most of the time, something a bit Picasso or Miroesque ends up on the page. I told the man about this, and after some convincing, he said he'd try it. And he did, but he could not, really could not, not look at the page. And he constantly picked the pen up off of the page. And he kept apologizing and saying "this doesn't look like me." I told him that wasn't the point, but he kept obsessing about how the picture didn't look like him at all. I doubt it's supposed to.
A burly guy in a Broncos hat on my left leaned over and said he could do a much better job on his. He also warned me about the other man saying, "I suppose it ain't any of my business, and I guess it's a lifestyle, but you be careful with that guy. He's a little, uh...you know what I'm sayin'?" Yeah, I got it. I'll be careful. So I handed him the paper and he began drawing. The concentration and dilligence displayed far exceeded the success of the final product. Like a hippo playing chess. But that's not the point. You draw what you draw. And I could tell the second man was disappointed that his didn't "look better" than the first's. I'm still curious about each man's individual reaction. Any thoughts?
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3 comments:
Feed the ego with beer; people like to see how pretty they look in a dimly lit room after a couple of drinks.
So, then, it must be that people who feel good about themselves while drinking continue to drink to make themselves feel better in that dim light. Bar cashes in. And by the time you're so drunk that you look so much like shit that you can recognize it, you're already too drunk to remember it in the morning.
I once read that a glance in the bar bathroom mirror after the 3rd or 4th drink is all it takes to shake one's confidence about how one looks. To that, I say "Amen!"
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