How I Made Red Cha-Cha Heels and Earned $1000

New York City is a glittering, expensive place where tiny slivers of mica schist sparkle in the pavement, and rain-soaked traffic light reflections blot out nighttime stars. People with swish jobs and regular paychecks traipse around in new clothes, eating delicious food in fancy restaurants, acquiring entertainment and culture in a run-around schedule of New York minutes. Snap snap snap. "You look FABULOUS darling. Are those new? I want those flame red cha-cha heels. Mwah, mwah. Got to run. Love ya, mean it!" Some of us can only look with our noses pressed up against the window, fogging up the glass with envy and the vapors of withheld saliva. Some of us don't bother any more and simply stay at home.

Let me explain...

One time I was working down on lower Broadway, in an area that morphed over a couple of decades from industrial warehouses into artist lofts and galleries, and is now a gigantic outdoor shopping mall. We New Yorkers call it, 'Soho.' The only thing to do during lunch break is shopping. Or, if you're like me and your money goes out the same day it comes in, window shopping. This is what we call working freelance.

My friend Cocito sat with me, back to back, in a tiny, windowless closet we called our office. He wouldn't let me use my computer because he was desperately trying to purchase Madonna tickets over the Internet, and had all the office computers jockeying to get in. He was all afluster and close to hyperventilating as he jumped from station to station with his credit card clutched tightly in his hot little hand. I stood back and well out of the way; no use trifling with an individual in pursuit of the gay man's holy grail.

Later, when we were able to relax into our work day, the project manager, Miss BoBally, gave me a photograph of a barefoot girl who needed shoes created from pixels. Naked feet were too enticing for publication in certain markets and they must be covered. "La Madre de los penguinos!" I exclaimed. This was not the first time. But today, I was inspired as if from above, and proceeded to clothe the feet as I saw fit, in a pair of flame red cha-cha heels. My memory filters recall a bonus of $1,000 for this spectacular feat of digital painting. I've remembered lots of other things that never happened, however.


to be continued...