The Squirming

Saturday, May 15, 2004

It was at that moment that I really saw my hand. The skin on the back of my hand was dry and chapped by the briny water I had used to wash it with. Of all my right-hand’s fingers, only the index finger could be seen as I was using it to point. The poorly clipped fingernail (darn my hasty Wednesday night preparations) was slightly dirty for reasons I’ll never understand. And my cuticle - one of many that have never seen a manicure.

At first as I looked at my finger I was surprised by how it looked. I thought the state of my hand made me look unkempt and dirty, but those thoughts were fleeting and hardly a reason for alarm. At this moment of realization those observations were not the issue of intense concern.

What I was concerned about was size - my hands looked really big and rough. At that particular moment, the extended index finger appeared to be larger than life and enhanced by some sort of finger-viagra. I wanted to pull my hand out of sight, but it was too late. All 6 eyes present were attentively observing the spot on the map of Venice I was pointing at. (At least that’s what I had hoped they were all paying attention to.)

The other two pairs of eyes belonged to two American women I was helping. They were both very pretty, but… Anyway when we all looked up from the map the one I was most concerned about quickly executed a smooth series of disorienting facial and body gestures, culminating in pulling the sunglasses from atop her head, and giving her head a little twist like some hair conditioner commercial. Her hair all fell into place in a very beautiful swirling-cascading motion that any nerd would have found breathtaking. “I think she’s doing the hair shake thing at me!” (Cassie had warned me of such things. Having now experienced this for myself I am surprised by the effectiveness of the move.) Thank the great maker for my at-home-training and natural defenses against such tactics! I broke the evil spell she had cast and sent them both on their way to San Marcos.

As I continued on my way all I could think was “size queen!”.

------------------------

If any of you have ideas on how to deal with European accommodations and change rooms efficiently, send me a tell so I can post them here. I was sort of trapped yesterday. After all of that traveling I was very caught off guard when the room they gave me was, cover your ears mom, C R A P. I was caught in a quandary about saying as much - “what if this IS the best room left“?

Anyway, in the end, there was so much not right about the room that there was absolutely no fuss about giving me a better room - if anything only hesitation and concern about my reaction to seeing how much better the next room was.

Today’s room is wonderfully airy, with views to the north west of a nearby church and to the east, a cascade of terra cotta roof tops. Bright, fresh breeze and enough space to turn around in. this morning the swallows were flying around in the space within my view, and now a lizard basks on a nearby wall - all of the heat of the day is on the other side of the building.”.

You know how it is - hotels have a system - the bellman already has your luggage before you can say “I can do it myself“, before you even have the key. So you and the bellman go all the way to the room, and you‘re supposed to say at that moment “thisa rooma isa crapa!”? All I can think is that I have to step into the process actively before the hotel gets to pull their usual processes into play - even if the language barrier gets into the way. If the bellman approaches I need to be ready to say to both the bellman and the manager “I’d like to leave my bags here and inspect the room first”. Even if the bellman is nowhere in sight the request for room review has to be made before the room appears to be “mine”.

I remember when I got into yesterday’s room and being stunned. When the door closed behind me, I looked at the escape route map for the floor, and my room was NOT the smallest of the lot. That’s when my questions about what to do next got complicated. [Oh my god! I just remembered what he said to me. He told me the room next door I was asking to swap to was a “double” - but according to the escape map it wasn’t that much bigger than the room I wanted to get out of!]

Hmmm, as I think about this hotel procedure I‘m designing, I wonder if I should ask for two keys, the room they want to give me and “the key to the best available room in the hotel at that moment“. It at least says “I know rooms vary, and I’m not demanding the best room. The room you’re offering had better not look dramatically worse". The way the hotel clerk was squirming to explain the differences between yesterday’s room and today’s felt like I had him by the balls - which leads me to another story…

------------------------------------------