“you’re an art model does that mean you’re NAKED?” “yeah” “whoa….those lucky artists ;)”
…buddy.
idk who started the idea that life drawing classes have anything sexy going on like. there’s at least ten people in the room and we’re all tired and covered in charcoal.
the dude in front who’s staring at my boobs has been trying to get the shading right for 10 minutes. he’s almost out of paint. he is crying.
The ice burg being frozen solid because there are NEVER ENOUGH SPACE HEATERS.
I was an artist’s model in uni since it paid better than any other student work position. Did a life drawing class one semester, despite it being an unheated old building in the winter evenings, because the instructor was a decent fellow who always had extra space heaters. So there I am one evening, exhausted from my team’s afternoon practice, but I’m in a comfortable position on a padded stool, ready to hold the position for like fifteen minutes. Space heaters all around me, spotlights on me to get shadows in interesting places.
Beyond the red glow of the heaters and the hot-white of the spotlights, the massive drafty room is dark and quiet, broken only by the instructor’s whispers and the scratch of charcoal on paper. Me, I’m just dozing, ‘cause my ancient dorm was heated with creaky old steampipes that never really got warm, and with the new extra-powered space heater alongside the others, that night was the warmest I’d been in a month. I dozed, basking in the glorious warmth.
And then I fell asleep.
And then I fell off the stool.
I woke up rather abruptly on the cold wooden platform, and looked up to see an entire ring of terrified and worried faces around me. Everyone had their hands up, ready to help me up, except no one had touched me. Naked chick laid out face-down on the floor, and all the men and women were suddenly acutely aware they couldn’t just grab a half-asleep dazed naked chick.
Fortunately someone had the bright idea to tear the sheet down from the backdrop, lay it over me as a wrap, and then everyone was quick to help me up.
After that, the instructor and students got used to taking turns talking to me, just to make sure I wasn’t dozing off. Which was weird, at first, because I’d done two semesters just being a silent prop, and now I was interacting. It gave the class a vibe completely unlike any other I’d modeled for, and it ended up one of my favorite modeling experiences.
postscript: months later, walking on campus with someone who’d eventually become my spouse, we passed some guys on the main path. One of them stopped, peered at me, and then said hello, excitedly, saying, “sorry, I didn’t recognize you, I’ve never seen you with your clothes on!”
This is honestly so delightful and accurate
The only situation where saying “I’ve never seen you with your clothes on” is a completely normal thing to say.
What this means is, that ever single one of the following
Jack Be Nimble (who jumped over burning candles for fun)
Jack the Giant Killer (who sold his cows for magic beans then robbed and killed a giant)
Stingy Jack (who tricked the devil so many times he was banned from both afterlives)
Jack of Jack and Jill (who splattered his head open falling down a hill)
Jack o’ Lantern (the headless horseman spirit of halloween)
Jack Frost (the spirit who heralds the end of autumn and the start of winter)
Are literally the same jackass who made so many bad life choices he ended up an immortal ice dullahan with a pumpkin serving as both his head and flashlight
but what an incredible journey he had getting there
When a customer says some Weird Shit in the middle of check-out,
Okay, so very recently, I was cashiering for Publix, and it was late at night, and I actually didn’t wanna be there, go figure. So this woman walks up, buying about 15-20 items, which is a pretty clean run for me, so I’m scanning her groceries, and we carry a small conversation.
During this conversation, she asks me if I’m in school, and I say yes. I tell her about how exams went, as they were near that period, and told her I had a Biology exam that was over genetics. And she looks me straight in the eyes, with seriousness of a heart attack being read in every wrinkle of her white soccer mom face, and says: “Oh, I’m a Christian, I don’t believe in genetics.”
Flabbergasted. My eyes do that spinny rainbow thing that Apple computers do when theyre buffering. A second goes by. I’ve gone through all stages of grief at this point, but haven’t reached acceptance. I have to say something, I have to say SOMETHING. If I just stare at her through this, she’ll know I think she’s fucking dumb and she might get angry, and I don’t need that. Two seconds have gone by. I have stopped scanning groceries at this point, and am just being violently shot back and forth between two sections of the galaxy. I can feel my body taking leave of my soul. Three seconds. I have to say something.
“Anyway, I did well on my accounting exam, so that’s something. Do you have any coupons?”