The Teensy Party
It’s for my friend and so I have to go.
I am dead-dog spitting-gull tired but I have to go.
It’s Eichleberger’s 30th birthday, after, all, so there is no question –
So I go. And because it is his 30th and society dictates a big bash, being the artist and punster and all around wholesome guy that he is, his friends instead throw him a Teensy Party – the antithesis of big.
All week long there are invitations, hand printed on one-inch square paper cut outs with teensy handwriting and teensy directions and a teensy sketch of a birthday cake. The invitations pop up everywhere on campus – on the coffeehouse baked goods shelf, on the sugar table, in the 2-D studio, along the walkway to The Pines. Teensy this and teensy that. Teensy teensy.
I change my perspective for a week. I go in search of teensy. At the health food store there are teensy spoons and teensy coffee scoopers and teensy jams and teensy chocolates. At work there are teensy finger condoms in the first-aid kit. At the thrift store I find a teensy barrette and a teensy jar to fit all the teensy things in. There is a plaster molded teensy sleeping boy curled against a pillow with his thumb in his mouth and his bum in the air. The flap of his teensy pajamas is sprung open at the seam and his teensy butt cheeks protrude into the open air. It is dirty and odd and mildly pornographic and just the perfect thing to add to the jar of teensy things for Eichleberger’s Teensy Party.
The hour arrives and Noelle and I walk along the top of Conley Ridge in the direction of Z-Lo’s porch light, where the party is to be held. We are arm in arm and I carry a teensy rose in my left hand to accompany the jar of teensies. Dogs bark, grass blades rustle, friends holler and we are there, there, there before we know it, hands slapping backs now and lips kissing cheeks, and “Come in, come in,” Z-Lo says, pushing open a teensy cardboard cut out door in the sidewall of his not-so-teensy house. How he rigged this I may never know, but inside, the full scale of teensy emerges.
Teensy beer pong with teensy shot glasses and teensy ping pong paddles and balls the size of your thumb nail that people are actually successfully playing with. Teensy burger patties and buns, teensy potatoes and tomatoes. Teensy kegs and teensy bottles of Budweiser and then I see him, Eichleberger, in his teensy pants and too-tight shirt and rock start 80’s head band, the crotch of his jeans riding obscenely close to the folds of his skin. He is all smiles and dimples, that sweet blondie and round face I’ve known for almost two years, blue eyes to twinkle at the girls and a soft yet masculine voice to please the crowd. Even looks aside, this kid is one of the best guys I know (remember the Shady’s Café blog post? Same guy.) and so it is that I find myself way past my bedtime, my sane brain long gone, here in the middle of the mountains trapped in the land of teensy, putting a finger condom on Eichleberger’s left middle finger while he fake orgasms.
This is funny, right?
Yes, my friends it is, because this is how we see and this is how we live and this how we keep it real in the mountains, single and all of us huddled around the same dream of living, breathing, sleeping art, art, art in our little Utopia at the craft school.
Except my dream also includes homework, to I drink a teensy sake and have some teensy fries and then get a teensy kiss on the cheek from the man of the hour and before I know it I am back on the road. The hum of the Volvo feels right, the car’s weight like a security blanket for the 17 mile drive home. Tonight, 40 pages of memoir to read. Tomorrow, an artist interview to conduct, three boxes to pack in prep for the move, then a full day of work and a night of homework. It’s a list and it’s a dream in the making, all in one. And when I get home, it’s all reality, so I get down to business at the desk and finally, start writing.