Dissonance

Was thinking yesterday about perceptive dissonance. I’ve always wanted to use “dissonance” because it’s so punk rock. The name of the big local punk band when I was growing up: “Repulsion.” That’s another great word.

Anyway, yesterday I was driving to meet this lady in my writer’s group and a bird flew across the road. All I saw was the shadow racing across the surface of the road and I thought it was a small, dark animal. I cranked my brakes before I realized it was a shadow. On the same drive I approached a line of cars stopped at a red light and began to slow down. I looked in the rearview mirror and at the car behind me and when I looked back, the light was green and the line of cars was moving. My perception was that it had happened too fast; there was no way I’d been looking in the rearview mirror long enough for all that to happen in front of me. And where was my peripheral vision in all of this, anyway?

The lady I’m working with always slurs her words. I think she’s a secret drinker. She has the look of a secret drinker (slightly puffy, eyes slightly dry, deliberate movements). And I wonder sometimes about her rather muddied thought process. But then again, these could be signs of staggering genius. What do I know? She’s nice, anyway and it’s nice to be nice. Richie from Elmore Leonard’s “Killshot” wore a t-shirt with that saying on it, if I recall correctly.