Single Gun Theory and Sam

Today I was thinking about Sam. In 1994, R.R. Donnelley contracted with Ernst & Young to produce print material. I was hired on the night shift, initially to type financial statements, with the promise of the proofreading gig after a few months. It seemed like three or four months of typing. I typed in a room with people who had been typing, some for decades, eight hours a day. Three out of four typed over a 100 words a minute, and Sam, a new-hire like me, typed over 110 words a minute. (I figured out that part of the key to it was 'spaghetti' fingers, not tense fingers. Anyway. I think I went from 60 to 70 words a minute.)

Sam was not only an excellent typist, but generally brilliant. I thought he could probably run Ernst & Young with his hands tied behind his back. I found out what he really wanted to do was to perform in drag and he did that part-time.

Sam listened to Single Gun Theory when he worked. I bought the CD, "Flow, River of My Soul." Now I know there was not just one album. The lyrics and sound were so unforgettable and hauntingly beautiful; the following link will play "Fall," a song from that album, but you have to wait a moment for it to start http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-AuKsiGbQ4.

The night shift is such an unexpected alternate reality. Everyone sleeps when you work and vice-versa. If you aren't big on noise or having to talk to anyone much, it's great. It was actually just what I needed in 1994.

We ordinarily worked from about 8 at night to about 4 in the morning. It was a strange life. On breaks, I would look out on the silent city from 12 stories high on the corner of Ross and San Jacinto, feeling like an astronaut. Always dark, twinkling lights, nothing doing. Me in a capsule. Sometimes my friend, who booked hotel conference rooms at another skyscraper downtown during the day, would drop by at midnight for a chat in the capsule.

Driving home around 4:15 a.m., you see the raccoons crossing the streets. That was cool. I would pop in Single Gun Theory on the drive home--down the tollway all by myself to Carrollton (except for the night that guy in the red Maserati ran into the car in front of me at the Mockingbird exit.)

Sam was great company, and some nights it was just us two--him typing and me proofing, eventually. I don't know where he is today, but I hope he is somewhere on the stage in high heels or running things at some big company.