Puff paints, anyone?

Okay, so feeling a bit better, so here goes (thank you for the well wishes, by the way)…

Chloe’s “Tell me to break a leg” kept repeating in my head. The sinister, mean part of me I’ve never known was wishing she’d break a leg, literally, but then I immediately thought of how I’d then have to wait on her, hand and foot, and quickly erased the wish from my head. Instead, I got into my beat-up old car, which felt very shunned by the Lexuses all around it, and drove to Michael’s craft store.

I skimmed the puff paints aisle (Did you know there was one? I didn’t think so! It’s actually half of one, but still; way too many puff paints for my tastes). “Is it for a science project, dear?” the 65-year-old-ish woman wearing a Michael’s apron and neon pink lipstick asked. (WHY do older women wear these overly bright lipsticks? And, Estee Lauder and Clinique, why do you even make them? Which came first — the bright lipstick, or the old lady requesting it?) “No, not for me,” I said. “Because if it is, we ran out of all the planetary colors.” Did Chloe want “planetary”? And what does that even mean…? For no reason at all, I found myself asking the woman this very thing. “Oh, you know – the blues, the reds… all the bold colors of the Earth–” she answered. “I see,” I replied, cutting her off. “No, not planetary. More like… neon pink and orange,” I added. “Like your lipstick,” I wanted to say. But I didn’t. “Oh, for an alien planetary theme?” she wondered. Um… no. “Sure,” I said. She then helped me pick and choose the best and brightest colors imaginable as she told me how much fun puff paints were. Really? She said that down at the Senior Center, they did lots of “puff paint work.” Who knew?

By the way – who knew puff paints could be so expensive? For five-hundred invitations, Ms. Michael’s suggested 100 little bottles. I thought this was a bit extreme, so I went with 50; I could always come back before they closed, once I started the invites and saw how many invites one bottle got me, right?

I decided that although I could do the invites at my house, would I really get them done? I find home to be the last place to be disciplined, ya know? And I could do them at Chloe’s, but why would I? Besides, things were still weird between me and Dean, so… Anticipating the soon-to-come hand, puff paint pain, I did the next best thing (I think I was inspired by Ms. Michael’s): went down to the nearest Senior Center and asked if they’d like a new project…