Jan 26 2009
Random - Sometimes the best
Let’s face it, when you have a magic show and it’s on a stage, you really want to have a lot of people cheering, laughing, and giving you money at the end of the day. It’s just a thing that you do - otherwise you’d be practicing at home by yourself, right?
Last year I was performing at the Golden Gate Renaissance Faire and afterward, we took the week that followed and spent some time in San Francisco - just touristy things. Of course, since I’m a magician I took a little something to fidget with because that’s what we do.
So I’m standing outside at the Cannery (one of the many mini shopping centers off Fisherman’s Wharf) waiting for my best beloved to come out of the restaurant where we ate. Like many of these places, there’s a little stage area where, in better weather and economic times, performers do their thing. I’m standing there in my Tobias the Adequate jacket, just waiting…
There’s a family nearby - two young girls and their mother, apparently waiting for someone in the same manner I’m waiting for someone.
I absently reach into the air, pluck at something, and carefully convey it to my left hand.
I look into my hand, thoughtful, and tease out the corner of something… a little more tugging, and a long streamer of many colors emerges, the loose end held aloft by the constant breeze pushing through the courtyard. I look at it, then carefully tuck it, bit by bit, back into my hand, finally giving a little squeeze… and open my hand. Empty.
Out of the corner of my eye I see those two little girls watching me. I don’t say a darn thing. I just glance over at them and smile at them, the look of suprise and wonder on their faces.
Sometimes the best audiences are the ones we don’t plan for.
