My life is more like a sitcom, with a few dramatic touchstones. It’s called “Living Well”, as a nod to the old saying “the best revenge is living well”. It’s not centred around me exclusively, but more around myself, my husband, and my co-workers.
The theme song is Supertramp’s Take the Long Way Home, and the opening sequence is a lot of fast shots of a busy warehouse work environment, along with shots of customers in a store and people in uniform helping them out. It’s all done in time-lapse camera shots of the workplace interspersed with shots of the city of Seattle and drinking at the bar to emphasize the hectic-pace despite the medium-tempo song. It slows down in places so we may introduce our cast of characters: There’s H, the Mexican manager with the awesome finger rolls, there’s B, the assistant manager with dreds who walks on very thin ice, J our slapstick class-clown type who always feels held back, K, the ladder climber girl having a secret affair with someone in the company, the other J, the gay black man from the South, Me, the girl married to the old favourite co-worker who made manager at another store and is a little “out there” (my part of the credits is where the song goes: But there are times that you feel youre part of the scenery/All the greenery is comin down, boy - that’s where I stop walking through the warehouse to turn and look at the camera with a weary-yet-cheerful smile, probably wiping my brow), He, the steady, the stoic, the old reliable, and then there’s** A**, the new guy, and Brazilian - the gay J is having a hard time keeping it together around him. We all have our disagreements, but by the end of the day we’re all buddies and having a drink at the bar next door. Supporting characters are R, the outside sales rep, Greek guy who keeps goats, S, the surreal manager from another store, D, the Irishman who loves to take us out for drinks, and Big J, operations manager, Mormon.
There’s a killer soundtrack, too. *Light Years * by Sloan when K falls in love with the most impossible person, *Golden Brown * by **the Stranglers ** when we realise there is more to J than just a goofy clown and that underneath lies a troubled past, *Filthy Gorgeous * by the **Scissor Sisters **, that was the Christmas special, when me and gay J went to karaoke and dressed up very burlesque and put on a show, and *Pearl’s Cafe * by **the Specials ** for that special time I was drunk in the middle of the day with my Acadian/Irish buddies, and I had to stumble into the shade of the too bright alleyway (everything painted YELLOW!) to puke.
And many more, particularly because me and gay J tend to put on a bit of a show at the end of each work day, since it gets very quiet, our chores are done and we’re just waiting on the clock, so we crank up the radio and dance like fools. Last time it was *If I Had No Loot * by Tony! Toni! Tone!, which, at the halfway point, declared the song was too long for me, good god, can’t you see I’m overweight?, and J stops dancing, huffing and puffing, too, agrees the song is much too long… then slaps me on the shoulder and tells me to keep going, he’ll get me through it. I weakly continue to wave my arms about while he madly does the running man.
End credits plays the same song as the opening credits, shows us all going to bed at night, turning off our lights; some of us settling into easy sleep, others obviously forcing their eyes shut, a couple of them lay staring at the ceiling. Me? Sitting at my computer with my headphones on, a single lamp lit, typing furiously.
