I was sitting in the barber shop this morning. I didn’t have to be anywhere until one, so I had my morning free. I usually get my hair cut with a number two blade, but there is one lady I like to go to at this specific barber shop because she does a really thorough job despite it being a rather easy haircut. I should cut my hair more often, but I tend to let it grow until it is a bit too long. Then after I decide to get it cut, I usually wait another two weeks. It’s kind of weird that way I do that sometimes. I know I have something that I need to do, and when I look at my schedule and see that I have some free time, I think “oh yea, then I can go and do…” The problem is, I often fill up my free time with activities that don’t really give me much benefit. It’s almost as if when I have a big block of free time, it gives me the luxury of procrastinating even more.
Not that procrastination is always a bad thing in every situation. I was at an art museum with a buddy of mine last weekend, and we were looking at all the paintings. He was actually going there to try and get a phone number from one of the girls that worked there. He kind of knew her, but wanted to go with a friend. He thought it would be too obvious if he showed up by himself, asked for her number, and then left. He thought that he would appear to desperate. After putting it off for a few weeks, we finally went. The way he was describing his plan, he made it sound like he was planning a jewelry heist or something.
One of more interesting paintings was one by a guy whose name I forgot. The guy painted it when he was well into his eighties, and it was his first work. They had little biographies of the painters under each painting, as none of them were world famous. This guy had wanted to be a painter his whole life, but as it said on the card “life kept getting in the way.” Some of the cards had just the basic biographical information, and other cards had a lot more. This had a message the artist wrote, which was kind of advice. It said as follows:
Gentle reader. Painting can be a difficult task. Sometimes you have a spirit in you that you have to release. If you cannot release it, you will lose it’s flavor forever. You must imagine the painting finished before you. You must imagine your future on that blank canvas of your mind, so that you can overcome any obstacles that stand you way. You must make the colors bright, and the images crisp. You must bring your future to the present, and push out all that stops you.
The funny thing was that my friend read that quote probably twenty times. He was standing about a meter from the girl whom he wanted to ask out, and when he finally got the courage, she said yes. And when I asked him about the quote on the way home, he didn’t even remember what I am talking about.
And finally my barber came in, but because I was in such a hurry, she wasn’t able to do as thorough a job as she normally does. I’ll never make the mistake again of missing on one of her fantastic haircuts. I learned my lesson.