Mr. Harley's Guide to Life, Love and Tomato Sauce

Substance abusers and ex-substance abusers just might just be the most insightful people on the planet. Seriously. And I just might be the stupidest.

I call myself a keen observer of human nature. I like to think that I'm smart and insightful and clever and all those brilliant adjectives. I'm so not. For instance, I badly misjudged a situation tonight.

I sallied into what I call the Ganja Starbucks, because I have strong suspicious that all sorts of things above the power of clove and tobacco get smoked out on the patio once the sun goes down. I've never asked, and I've never been told.

Where was I? I sailed in searching for a venti iced mocha, a donut and a place to charge my laptop. The baristas looked up from cleaning and pretending to sell Starbucks Via long enough to make me a drink and chat. I couldn't park in my normal spot that afforded a view of the registers and the barista antics because some old dude was there with a laptop, a portable printer - AND TWO BOXES OF PIZZA. He had sprawled out across a space meant for six. Dude. Seriously, I understand you need work space, but keep your food detritus to yourself.

I wander into the lobby and am immediately put off by a large biker-type wearing a Harley T-shirt and a bandana and some black shorts that are straining to cover his ham hock thighs. He is practically yelling at a professional-looking woman in a business suit and a pageboy bob who is gripping a cup of coffee for all its worth. I'm shocked she's not wearing most of a cup of Colombian all over her manicure by now.

You always wonder at these oddball pairings. Attorney/client? Shrink/headshrunk? Therapist/patient? AA sponsor/sponsoree? Blind date? Or something more sinister? Is it blackmail? White male? Something in between?

At first, I seriously thought this was some sort of "socialization" exercise. This used to happen every Thursday at the mall, where volunteers would bring girls from the local group home "out" to socialize in a "real world" environment. The extra-loud voice, the ill-fitting clothes on him, the ultra-dressy outfit on her, all spoke to some sort of social inequality - and like it or not, our society judges people based on how they look.

I decide this situation - whatever the hell it is - has better drama potential than the old guy with the pizza boxes, so I set up in the corner. It soon becomes obvious that appearances were deceiving.

Every time I think I unraveled it, it got a bit more crazy. And then more crazy still. Until finally it leapt off the deep end into a pool of whipped cream (yes, I'm going to keep going back to that) crazy with chocolate sprinkles and did the backstroke while performing a routine to Lady Gaga's "PokerFace" - in unison with seventeen trained manatees and a scarlet starfish. I was typing notes and finally just quit. There's no way to make this into a narrative. It can't even BEGIN to make sense.

Therefore, I present to you, the Starbucks Reading Public, the Collected Proverbs and Rhyme of Mr. Harley!

#1. Mr. Harley's Red Beans & Rice: Throw four handfuls of rice, some pepper and a pound of sausage into a pot. Boil for 2 hours.
#2. Mr. Harley's Marinara: 2 cans Hunts tomato paste, 4 tomatoes, 1 med. grated carrot, parsley, heat 15 min. stirring constantly! Apparently, the key to THIS dish is the acidity of the carrots. I personally despise carrots in my tomato sauce - and besides, opening up to cans of tomato paste is cheating. You might as well buy a jar of Ragu.
#3. "Fear is good."
#4. "Beer is good."
#5. "Be very afraid."
#6. "Key West is nice" and its corollary, "There are no clocks in Key West."
#7. Saxophones are musical sex. This one was accomplished by much hooting and guffawing of "YOU KNOW I"M RIGHT!"
#8. "Musicians don't leave room for people with real talent to play."
#9. "The Renaissance was better [than the Greeks] just because it had the Italians." There were also words describing anatomical actions I don't feel comfortable repeating.
10. God, I don't know. I ate a donut and sort of quit listening after a certain point. It didn't make any sense and my brain hurt trying to figure it out.

I *think* - and this is only a guess, that HE was HER *something* Anonymous adviser and this was one of those "crisis of confidence" meetings. The more I listened, and the more I looked, I realized that my initial impressions were probably wrong.

He wasn't dressed as poorly as I thought. Yes, he had on a Harley-Davidson T-shirt that strained to keep his gut in, but it was just worn, not dirty or ripped or torn. His pants were clean and his beard was trimmed. It looked like he simply dressed in a great hurry - which is what "sponsors" do when their "sponsorees" call, right?

For the quiet woman's part, she wasn't dressed as well as I though at first glance. Her business suit wasn't a business suit. It was a pair of worn slacks that could have come from a thrift store and the shirt was just as worn. That doesn't mean anything either - she could have just been secretarial class instead of management. Her nails were nice though, as was her hair. She hadn't gone too far down the slope, or else was on her way back up.

But her carriage and demeanor was the most obvious sign. She simply looked frail, and this was apparent once I got the chance to really study her. What I thought was her pain at an awkward situation and a lost evening was really pain for her own hurts. In retrospect it was clear - no doctor or therapist or volunteer would be so crass as to feel embarrassment *for* the person they are helping.

She spoke hardly a word the entire time she was here - Mr. Harley kept the conversation roaring like a hog pointed down the open road. She'd mumble a response in a soft voice.

They left together, although there was absolutely no touching, no hug, no handshake, no familiarity. He dropped his coffee cup in the can, she dropped hers, she "freshened up" while he waited and they exited the door.

I stand by my call that it was either an emergency AA sponsor meeting or the worst blind date in history.