Rich is my pal. The word "pal" really holds a lot of water in Persistance. You would never doublecross your pal. You'd stand up for your pal. Being pals means never having to say you're sorry1. In the heat of fierce band disputes, the moment "pal" is uttered, some of the anger diffuses, and you can't help but feel good. It took awhile, but after almost 2 years in this band, I know that Rich and I are pals.
Rich is the wildly talented sax player in the jazz band I sing with. Nobody doesn't like the way he plays. So come see him sometime if you haven't already. He plays in several bands, spanning genres from reggae to salsa. Rich also expertly plays the flute, but he doesn't get a chance to do that with us very often. Anyway, I really look up to all the guys in the band, musically, and I feel outclassed and outjazzed most of the time. In a good way, though, I guess. It makes me work harder to keep up with them. In a male-dominated, politically incorrect profession like ours, I can't help but feel flattered by his referral to me as a "musician" rather than "nice little girl singer".
Jazz players can be tough to deal with, but the audiences can be even stickier. The blessing and curse of being the nice little girl singer is that I have breaks. I only sing 50-60% of the time we are performing. The downside to being unoccupied is having to talk to rude people. Don't get me wrong, a lot of people just have nice things to say, but I have regular encounters with opinionated, inebriated meanies. I am terrible at confrontations, and feel as if I have to endure whatever drunken diatribe the present asshole is spouting. After a recent gig, a guy started off just fine, telling me how he was impressed, and that I appeared to have trouble specializing in one genre. Fine. Then he talked my ear off for a good 15 minutes, concluding that he is a lawyer who "knows people" and that I obviously listen to a lot of Celine Dion, and that I really didn't have the figure for this profession. Now, I don't know if he lost me when he insulted my physique, or when he accused me of being a Celine fan. Anyway, I felt alone and sad, and hurt, and unable to run... "Hi, I'm Rich," I heard from a few feet away. Rich had been watching this exchange, and had heard enough. He dominated this guy's space by forcing him to chat, giving me a much-needed exit route. That is what a pal does. I don't know if Rich knew how badly I needed someone to stand up for me, but it is one of the best pal maneuvers I can remember.
1. Actually, the last one isn't necessarily true, but Bob says that when he doesn't want to apologize for something shitty he said.
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