Flea Market Flop

On Sunday, I explored the Mile High Market.

Excited by the prospect of of sifting through vintage chic treasures and scoring the season's first organic morels and local goat cheese, I set off to Henderson, a tad worried that my 11am departure meant I would miss out on the best baguette.

Boy, was I wrong! I arrived and paid $6 to park ($3 in admission fees and $3 in ATM fees to get cash money to pay for said admission fee). My first clue about my misadventure should have been in the parking lot when I pulled in next to a truck who's paint job made me feel like I was idling next to an amusement park ride in all it's glittery mauve glory. Hey, if you've got it...flaunt it?

Afterwards, I strode through the gates ready to begin my buying adventure! I wish I'd had my real camera, My shiny expensive $500 Canon D5 that makes me look like a real photographer and not some artsy poser clutching an Instagram cell phone, because maybe then people would take me seriously while I photographed the Marachi  leader in the Yankee cap, or the booth of wigs and plastic Virgin de Guadelupes. (though, as it turns out, the only person I needed to be taken seriously by was myself. Or perhaps, to take myself less seriously.) This was not at all what I expected. Vendors hawked fleece Raiders blankets and Playboy paraphernalia. Plastic AK47's hung next to inflatable Spider Man mallets and shiny "designer" shoes and sunglasses... What is this place?! In the farmer's market section, I was dismayed to find only a dubious selection of fruit and chili. I wandered aimlessly for 30 minutes or so, attempting to stumble on some kernel, some oasis, of what it was I had hoped to find. No such luck.

Later, empty handed and stuck in traffic on I-225, I had to wonder...was this some version of the new American dream? Instead of nostalgia laden trinkets and yuppie farm to table produce, I had found something entirely different. Not a flirtation with the past, but a staunch declaration of the shiny new now. ..I won't get much further into this tangled tangent on shifting socioeconomics or racial politics, but I will explore something related: ideas of fear and courage.

It has come to my attention what a walking contradiction I am. While I apparently have no qualms about uprooting my life and moving to a new state where I have no immediate social or employment prospects, or cold e-mailing companies my resume- things that I'm sure would terrify any normal human-I do apparently lack the courage to declare myself an artist without the proof in hand. Instead of walking up to Mr. Mariachi and saying, "you have such an interesting face. Do you mind if I  take your photo?" I silently slink by, ingraining his image to memory and disparaging my lack of preparedness. I bet Christiane Amanpour doesn't ask herself for permission to be brave! It takes courage to  embrace your inner artist. You'd think I would have figured this out by now, coming from a family of artists! And, while I seem to be perfectly capable of handling rejection in every other aspect of my life, it appears I have yet to master the realm of artistic rejection. Even when the only one doing the rejection is myself. So, perhaps in this regard, the market wasn't a flop after all... in an effort to become yourself, you first have to believe in yourself.

Moral of the story:  Sometimes the biggest bully we have to stand up to, is ourselves. Stop waiting for permission to be the intrepid artist and as Nike would say, "Just do it".