Flannery O’Connor said it, and while we ‘slingers probably weren’t who she had in mind, I can’t think of a better breed to illustrate this observation. Consider the following:
Ten minutes into a cocktail party and I’m reminding the wife how much I don’t like people. Put a camera on my shoulder and I’ll high-five my way through a leper colony.
A friend of mine can field strip a twenty-thousand dollar videocamera, parallel-park a live truck covered in duct tape and slam together a minute thirty report during commercial breaks. Yet he still needs help filling out his time sheet every week.Loose women and fast cars don’t do a lot for me, but break out a fat shaft of daylight or a conveyor belt full of mason jars and I grow visibly titillated.
I’ve got buddies who can name every shade of gray visible in the average TV test pattern. But don’t expect them to match their pants with their shirt.
Life coaches, priests and financial advisors I got no use for. However, I keep a body language expert on speed-dial and a discount chiropractor on stand-by.
I myself have hung out of homemade helicopters, nodded off during hurricanes and interviewed a murderer or two. What really scares me are dying Double-A batteries and nighttime assignment editors with my phone number on their lips.
As far the above photo, It’s only young Robert Hollins plowing through another workday, one in which provocatively dressed women paddle the rumps of color-coordinated pedestrians while a certain Emmy award winning journalist wishes for invisibility… Nothing odd about that.